This thread is for the discussion of my latest article, Time Spiral Review for Legacy. We would be grateful if you would let us know what you think, but please keep your comments on topic.
Remove Mangura of Condor AND target permanent from the game.
Now if I read that right you must perform both actions. If you can't (say, Mangura gets shocked or Karakas'ed back to your hand) the ability won't work.
It's like the difference between Hex and Seeds of Strength. With Hex if you fizzle one critter target the spell fails, with Seeds fizzling one has no effect on the other two.
Or at least that's how I understand the game. I could be wrong.
I think Smallpox will be awesome in non-standard formats. It's an extremely solid card... but not quite enough to base a deck off of. I'm not sure it's got a deck to fit into in standard, but if you've got a way to make discard work for you (along with not having a creature in play, and make the land-sac not so bad, both of which are in standard)... the possibility to 3 for 1 your opponent for BB is awesome. Same card advantage as Ancestrial Recall, for one mana more, and the CA is actually used in destroying things immediately, instead of sitting in your hand.
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Banana of the Month Feb '05 Cool stuff here.
Trickbind may have been a good mention as well; it is a good way to combat Iggy-Pop, Solidarity or other storm-based combos, presenting you with a way to counter their kill condition the turn they try to go off. It can be played around (if you have a second Brain Freeze and mana to play it, though a second Tendrils of Agony is a bit harder to play usually), but it certainly appears to be a step up from Stifle since you can't respond to it. It also has the extra advantage of shutting down some pesty creatures in play that are usually pretty resilent or otherwise hard to deal with. And if Time Vault hadn't been re-re-re-errated, then it would have been another way to combat that.
Otherwise, an excellently done article for Legacy players (or for people who enjoy the format, but don't get enough chances to play it, like me).
Trickbind is one of those cards I found myself asking folks about since my own intuition was that it was not particularly better than Stifle. No one seemed to be interested, but I think that all the split second cards deserve a second look. That ability is just really good. Ultimately I left it out because it is still as narrow as Stifle for the most part. As a hoser, Stifle sometimes works against storm decks, but only if the rest of your deck puts pressure on them to go off too early. There are better options right now. But down the road, who knows.
Academy's Ruins - I agree with it, but you could have mentioned Mindslaver Lock.
Ancestral Vision - Sucks.
Conflagrate - Sucks.
Deep Sea Kraken - I'll say this, and then lose to it - In the format of creature removal and "Counter target spell," this card is terrible.
Liege of the pit - Pretty unplayable
Magus of the Candelabra - Ok in casual, regarded as the weakest Magus
Magus of the Disk - White has better board sweepers, and Nevinyrral's Disk is less prone to getting killed before use.
I would have liked to see a mention of Fathom Seer, as well as Trickbind. I also think Stuffy Doll combo may make an appearance in the Metagame.
Nice article, lists all the things that I would have expected to see.
Two comments tho: Magus of the Disk - I think this looses a lot of power over the memory jar by not being an artifact, mainly it gets summoning sick (eeeew) and can't be welded back into play, saying this I'm sure it's ok, just not as good as the hype.
Angel's Grace - indeed you do "Play not to lose" - but I would take this every time in Scepter/Chant or simlar, it's almost as effective as stifle in stopping a win from any storm based deck, it give you that nice little pause for a gaea's blessing trigger to get through and stops opponents from laughing past a scepter/chant lock by hitting you in your turn. This plus the blessing are a match made in heaven for stopping brain freeze wins. That said it is a very niche use.
How does it do anything special for your Gaea's Blessing triggers? And most certainly how does this do anything for stopping brain freeze? At best, you could put it on a scepter, and use it every turn, on your turn, to prevent from decking out, which seems suboptimal.
Wow. That's pretty indepth. Lemme re-read that, make sure I didn't miss anything.
When you're done, you can provide some input on the article, because even though you felt the need to attack mine, you conveniently didn't provide anything more than "good job" yourself. Something about a glass house, and throwing rocks.
Damnit, I hate playing creatures in a format with creature removal and counterspells. How am I ever going to kill my opponent?
Wow, congratulations on not knowing what the hell you're talking about. It probably has something to do with this:
Thanks for the enjoyable read, even being a Standard player.
Not that there's anything wrong with being a Standard player, but in a format that is defined by a one Mana creature attempting to connect with your opponent, this guy (who hits the RFG zone turn 3, and doesn't hit play until turn 5 on average, possibly later) isn't blue's most relevant threat. He has to compete with Sea Drake, Meloku (who doesn't see play), Serendib Efreet, Morphling (who doesn't see play), and Exalted Angel, Mystic Enforcer, and Fledgling Dragon as finishers, all of which hit faster or are more effective than him.
Enjoyable article. It helps me to think of cards in ways other then their casual applications. I'm always up for articles like this. I agree though that the Split Second cards should have been given at least a once over.
How does it do anything special for your Gaea's Blessing triggers? And most certainly how does this do anything for stopping brain freeze? At best, you could put it on a scepter, and use it every turn, on your turn, to prevent from decking out, which seems suboptimal.
Good article. Thank you for pointing Conflagrate's combo finisher potential out. You just need a huge hand and RR. A damn shame that it will probably never be better than ToA or Freeze.
For those interested, the interaction with angel's grace and Gaea's Blessing is as follows:
Normally, your Solidarity-playing opponent wins with a combination of Brain Freeze and Stroke of Genius, making you draw a card when you can't, and winning the game at instant speed. Adding Gaea's Blessing to your deck makes this more difficult, since they have to either Stroke you for your whole library, or continually respond to the Gaea's Blessing Triggers (from being put in your graveyard) and finish you with them still on the stack. Adding Gaea's Blessing and Angel's Grace into the picture, the Finishing Stroke of Genius will no longer be effective, since you can't lose the game this turn, and so they Blessing triggers will resolve, resulting in you shuffling your graveyard back into your library.
I just want to mention Smallpox. It has been doing quite well in a new Pox build I have been testing with a few Legacy playing friends. I don't think Pox is a contender, but could suprise sometime as a rogue deck.
"Sufficiently advanced experience is indistinguishable from clairvoyance." -Carsten
"Ah those eyes, those horrible creepy eyes!" -Chaosof99
DCI Level 3 Judge & TO "I do not consider myself a hero. I know only what the Vec teach:
justice must always be served and corruption must always be opposed."
Go read! I am one of the three authors of Cranial Insertion.
But seriously, if you can't remember "Woapalanne", just call me Eli.
Damnit, I hate playing creatures in a format with creature removal and counterspells. How am I ever going to kill my opponent?
Nice sarcasm... While you are partly right, the fact that there is a lot of removal in a format does matter on the choice of your creatures. Best creatures in Magic are either hard to kill, give you reliable card advantage to replace themselves if they get killed, or are small enough to have the better deal when the opponent trades more expensive removal with them, or are a combination of these elements. Fully targetable fatties like Deepsea Kraken are bad when facing non-burn removal because they have practically neither of those qualities and so make for bad ressource trades. In addition, the Kraken is worse against counterspells than the other fatties of that kind since the opponent sees him coming trough suspend. I can see an indirect hard-to-kill quality in Deepsea Kraken because you have full mana open to back him out when he goes on the stack, but that's pretty much it. Mr. Nightmare's opinion was valid IMO.
I'm a former judge (lapsed), who keeps up to date on rules and policy. Keep in mind that judges' answers aren't necessarily more valid than those of people who aren't judges; what matters is we can quote the rules to back up our answers. When in doubt, ask for such quotes.
Ancestral Vision - Sucks.
Conflagrate - Sucks.
Deep Sea Kraken - I'll say this, and then lose to it - In the format of creature removal and "Counter target spell," this card is terrible.
Liege of the pit - Pretty unplayable
Magus of the Candelabra - Ok in casual, regarded as the weakest Magus
Magus of the Disk - White has better board sweepers, and Nevinyrral's Disk is less prone to getting killed before use.
Imagination, my good man! Today's decks will not always be the best out there. These are cards I know I am going to pick up because they have good potential. I thought I made that clear.
Sure Thresh will own Deep Sea Kraken (I know that's what you meant, you dirty dog), but you can't deny that it is cheap for a beastie that is safely out of the game. So it may eventually be what you need.
Magus of the Disk? Who says I plan on waiting around for a turn?
...regarded as the weakest Magus
Not by me.
BTW, Mr. N, have you considered that it takes 13 mana to do the Mindslaver loop? It might be good if you use the weakest magus to make the mana though.
BTW, Mr. N, have you considered that it takes 13 mana to do the Mindslaver loop? It might be good if you use the weakest magus to make the mana though.
It does, you're right. On the other hand, it takes 10 to use it once, and after that you can usually take all the time and mana you want to keep it going. I'm not saying its good, just that its worth mentioning.
When you're done, you can provide some input on the article, because even though you felt the need to attack mine, you conveniently didn't provide anything more than "good job" yourself. Something about a glass house, and throwing rocks.
I rather leave "good job," rather than feedback that isn't even about the article, merely negative, 1-word quips about particular cards that were breifly discussed, with no real support for my positions.
Wow, congratulations on not knowing what the hell you're talking about. It probably has something to do with this:
Not that there's anything wrong with being a Standard player, but in a format that is defined by a one Mana creature attempting to connect with your opponent, this guy (who hits the RFG zone turn 3, and doesn't hit play until turn 5 on average, possibly later) isn't blue's most relevant threat. He has to compete with Sea Drake, Meloku (who doesn't see play), Serendib Efreet, Morphling (who doesn't see play), and Exalted Angel, Mystic Enforcer, and Fledgling Dragon as finishers, all of which hit faster or are more effective than him.
Fine, the card is inferior to other options available to deck builders, atleast in your opinion (not that I disagree with that assessment). Not because there are counterspells and removal in the format, but because those other options are simply better. Perhaps it is my lack of in-depth familiarity with legacy, but is there any commonly-used removal that would kill Deep-Sea Kraken that wouldn't also kill Exalted Angel? The removal isn't the issue, the card itself is.
Excellent article. Really very well done. Seriously, do this for ever set. Please
Anyways, I only have two issues with it:
- The only instance where Sudden Death is considerably better than Sudden Shock is when dealing with Werebear. And Sudden Shock can still handle him before the Threshold-reaching card resolves. And at a much more playable cost. With Baloth, the player isnt likely to be countering things if he's playing Baloth, and the life loss isnt worth that much. Maybe in The Rock mirror?
- I really would have liked to hear your take on Trickbind, given your clarity on the basics and insight beyond that, both of which you've demonstrated admirably.
I just want to mention Smallpox. It has been doing quite well in a new Pox build I have been testing with a few Legacy playing friends. I don't think Pox is a contender, but could suprise sometime as a rogue deck.
I don't think Smallpox is good enough to warrent it's own deck... I do, however, think it's good enough to be a quite awesome addition to a deck that, say, likes puting things from it's hand into it's graveyard. A deck that mightalsolike lands that go to the graveyard.
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Banana of the Month Feb '05 Cool stuff here.
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On a more serious note, no love for chameleon blur?
On an even more serious note, nice article, although I think you overrated a few cards.
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Now if I read that right you must perform both actions. If you can't (say, Mangura gets shocked or Karakas'ed back to your hand) the ability won't work.
It's like the difference between Hex and Seeds of Strength. With Hex if you fizzle one critter target the spell fails, with Seeds fizzling one has no effect on the other two.
Or at least that's how I understand the game. I could be wrong.
With Hex, you have to have 6 different targets to be able to play it. But if some of those targets then go away, it will still kill the rest.
Possibly the last remaining member of the Banana Clan (+1)
Banana of the Month Feb '05
Cool stuff here.
Otherwise, an excellently done article for Legacy players (or for people who enjoy the format, but don't get enough chances to play it, like me).
Trickbind is one of those cards I found myself asking folks about since my own intuition was that it was not particularly better than Stifle. No one seemed to be interested, but I think that all the split second cards deserve a second look. That ability is just really good. Ultimately I left it out because it is still as narrow as Stifle for the most part. As a hoser, Stifle sometimes works against storm decks, but only if the rest of your deck puts pressure on them to go off too early. There are better options right now. But down the road, who knows.
This is about Legacy, right? I couldn't tell.
Academy's Ruins - I agree with it, but you could have mentioned Mindslaver Lock.
Ancestral Vision - Sucks.
Conflagrate - Sucks.
Deep Sea Kraken - I'll say this, and then lose to it - In the format of creature removal and "Counter target spell," this card is terrible.
Liege of the pit - Pretty unplayable
Magus of the Candelabra - Ok in casual, regarded as the weakest Magus
Magus of the Disk - White has better board sweepers, and Nevinyrral's Disk is less prone to getting killed before use.
I would have liked to see a mention of Fathom Seer, as well as Trickbind. I also think Stuffy Doll combo may make an appearance in the Metagame.
I'm assuming you mean Magus of the Jar?
How does it do anything special for your Gaea's Blessing triggers? And most certainly how does this do anything for stopping brain freeze? At best, you could put it on a scepter, and use it every turn, on your turn, to prevent from decking out, which seems suboptimal.
Wow. That's pretty indepth. Lemme re-read that, make sure I didn't miss anything.
Damnit, I hate playing creatures in a format with creature removal and counterspells. How am I ever going to kill my opponent?
Extendo
When you're done, you can provide some input on the article, because even though you felt the need to attack mine, you conveniently didn't provide anything more than "good job" yourself. Something about a glass house, and throwing rocks.
Wow, congratulations on not knowing what the hell you're talking about. It probably has something to do with this:
Not that there's anything wrong with being a Standard player, but in a format that is defined by a one Mana creature attempting to connect with your opponent, this guy (who hits the RFG zone turn 3, and doesn't hit play until turn 5 on average, possibly later) isn't blue's most relevant threat. He has to compete with Sea Drake, Meloku (who doesn't see play), Serendib Efreet, Morphling (who doesn't see play), and Exalted Angel, Mystic Enforcer, and Fledgling Dragon as finishers, all of which hit faster or are more effective than him.
How so? Please explain how you are planning on putting the Gaea's Blessing onto an Isochron Scepter?
Normally, your Solidarity-playing opponent wins with a combination of Brain Freeze and Stroke of Genius, making you draw a card when you can't, and winning the game at instant speed. Adding Gaea's Blessing to your deck makes this more difficult, since they have to either Stroke you for your whole library, or continually respond to the Gaea's Blessing Triggers (from being put in your graveyard) and finish you with them still on the stack. Adding Gaea's Blessing and Angel's Grace into the picture, the Finishing Stroke of Genius will no longer be effective, since you can't lose the game this turn, and so they Blessing triggers will resolve, resulting in you shuffling your graveyard back into your library.
Let's not. Be good or I'll have to take youse's toys away and bury youse's puppies in the sandbox.
"Sufficiently advanced experience is indistinguishable from clairvoyance." -Carsten
"Ah those eyes, those horrible creepy eyes!" -Chaosof99
DCI Level 3 Judge & TO
"I do not consider myself a hero. I know only what the Vec teach:
justice must always be served and corruption must always be opposed."
Go read! I am one of the three authors of Cranial Insertion.
But seriously, if you can't remember "Woapalanne", just call me Eli.
Nice sarcasm... While you are partly right, the fact that there is a lot of removal in a format does matter on the choice of your creatures. Best creatures in Magic are either hard to kill, give you reliable card advantage to replace themselves if they get killed, or are small enough to have the better deal when the opponent trades more expensive removal with them, or are a combination of these elements. Fully targetable fatties like Deepsea Kraken are bad when facing non-burn removal because they have practically neither of those qualities and so make for bad ressource trades. In addition, the Kraken is worse against counterspells than the other fatties of that kind since the opponent sees him coming trough suspend. I can see an indirect hard-to-kill quality in Deepsea Kraken because you have full mana open to back him out when he goes on the stack, but that's pretty much it. Mr. Nightmare's opinion was valid IMO.
Imagination, my good man! Today's decks will not always be the best out there. These are cards I know I am going to pick up because they have good potential. I thought I made that clear.
Sure Thresh will own Deep Sea Kraken (I know that's what you meant, you dirty dog), but you can't deny that it is cheap for a beastie that is safely out of the game. So it may eventually be what you need.
Magus of the Disk? Who says I plan on waiting around for a turn?
Not by me.
BTW, Mr. N, have you considered that it takes 13 mana to do the Mindslaver loop? It might be good if you use the weakest magus to make the mana though.
I rather leave "good job," rather than feedback that isn't even about the article, merely negative, 1-word quips about particular cards that were breifly discussed, with no real support for my positions.
Fine, the card is inferior to other options available to deck builders, atleast in your opinion (not that I disagree with that assessment). Not because there are counterspells and removal in the format, but because those other options are simply better. Perhaps it is my lack of in-depth familiarity with legacy, but is there any commonly-used removal that would kill Deep-Sea Kraken that wouldn't also kill Exalted Angel? The removal isn't the issue, the card itself is.
Extendo
Anyways, I only have two issues with it:
- The only instance where Sudden Death is considerably better than Sudden Shock is when dealing with Werebear. And Sudden Shock can still handle him before the Threshold-reaching card resolves. And at a much more playable cost. With Baloth, the player isnt likely to be countering things if he's playing Baloth, and the life loss isnt worth that much. Maybe in The Rock mirror?
- I really would have liked to hear your take on Trickbind, given your clarity on the basics and insight beyond that, both of which you've demonstrated admirably.
Rock on Finn. Keep writing.
Legacy: Strawberry Shortcake, Aggro Loam, DnT+b
Modern: Devoted Karn
Vintage: Survival
I don't think Smallpox is good enough to warrent it's own deck... I do, however, think it's good enough to be a quite awesome addition to a deck that, say, likes puting things from it's hand into it's graveyard. A deck that might also like lands that go to the graveyard.
Possibly the last remaining member of the Banana Clan (+1)
Banana of the Month Feb '05
Cool stuff here.