MTG Salvation

Quote from flaming infinity

The intention is obvious and spelled out. It's a product for serious collectors and the serious Commander pimpers that would shell out $100 for a foil Brainstorm to foil out their deck. It's not like anyone needs a foil Brainstorm. You could get a regular one for a buck or from that duel deck that comes out Friday. It's just like no one had to have that shiny Maze of Ith from FTV when you could pick up an Italian one for $20 or less. Premium decks and foil packs have also proven that the only way to sell a foil product is to stuff it full of high dollar cards since most players are unwilling to pay extra for shiny cards.

Of course, that being said, it didn't have to be quite so limited. It's not like FTV had trouble selling. Of course, it might not actually be quite so limited. The exception part might mean it's really limited in stores and most of them were allotted to large, online retailers that have proven they have the customer base to move product at higher prices than a lot of local gamestores can. Honestly, that would be the logical way to distribute FTV too if it weren't a gift to the brick and mortar stores.

I can definitely understand why people are confused about the intention or target audience of this product.

The announcement says that it is for collectors and "avid commander players," not necessarily "Commander pimpers" (though I guess they can't exactly say that in the official announcement).

The inclusion of sleeves and counters implies it is maybe for newer players who don't already have that kind of stuff.

The inclusion of oversized cards implies that they have no idea what their customers want since hardly anyone seems to care about the oversized cards at all.

The limited print run implies that it is for those willing to spend serious money (the collectors and deck pimpers you mentioned).

I mean... if this really is for collectors, foilmongers, etc, why include all the other crap? Why even frame it as a Commander product?

To me, regardless of how bad or good any individual cards with unleash end up being, the keyword still seems to be one of the most uninteresting and unnecessary keywords yet. It literally can only do one thing, ever.
At least with hellbent anything could be tacked on, including powerful effects since having no cards in hand is a pretty bad thing, and it could be used with creature and non-creature spells.

Quote from bLatch

Don't get me wrong, I do not have a problem with them making a short run of a product for collectible purposes. Where I am disappointed is that they said this would be "for avid commander players", and it is clearly not. It is for avid Magic Collectors.

It's not geared toward commander players in the slightest.

This is pretty much how I feel about this product. I consider myself an avid commander player; it's pretty much the only format I play, actually.

I preordered one of these pretty much as soon as I could and if they really are as limited as some are suggesting, I will probably not end up with one.

It's disappointing that many others will be in the same situation.

It's going to be hilarious if this product does turn out to be super-limited, but the contents are crap.

Quote from Wydogg5305 »

Wasteland has been printed 3 times.


Rishadan Port isn't a casual favorite, and doesn't rly see any play anywhere outside of outdated legacy goblins (a fringe deck, to put it nicely)

Uh, Desert has been printed 3 times previously to this, so can that really be seen as an argument against reprinting wasteland?

The fact that this includes some cards that are objectively just not good (regardless or value) pretty much disqualifies it as being 'stone cold nuts.' I still think it's still a good set though.

Quote from RWF_Less

I've never had a store sell any Duel Deck, Premium Series, or any other product for higher than MSRP. Is that a common occurance for everyone else?

I've seen local shops sell some of the event decks and some of the commander precons for more than MSRP for sure. Not the premium or duel decks though.

Quote from David.boose

I was happy with just dryad arbor you guys are just super spoiled. i would of paid the msrp for that card alone

I don't want to complain too much; it's still a nice set. I was fully expecting Wasteland after Vesuva was spoiled though. I'm sure you'd agree Windbrisk Heights is pretty bleh by comparison.

And Desert and Shivan Gorge??? Come on... no one wants those cards.

Quote from despair

Bleh to the rest of the reveal... Shouldn't have ordered that third box just now!

Exactly how I feel...

Why do they always save the bad stuff for the end?? Disappointed that there's not a wasteland...

Quote from Kapagami

Has anyone seen the collectors number of the Sylvan Library. To my untrained eye, it seems to be 17/79 or something. Anyone else?

It's 17/18

I've finally gotten around to making some kind of version of this deck. It's pretty different from the list in the original post, but it's set up to win with Worldgorger Dragon mainly, so I figure it's similar enough.

There are several things I'm not sure about yet.

Necrotic Ooze and Mog Fanatic: do I really need these for their extra combo with Kiki-Jiki?

Should Magus of the Bazaar be in here even though he can't go nuts with Worldgorger/Animate Dead like the real Bazaar can? I had him in originally, but he got replaced with Sphinx of Lost truths so I can mill my library.

Is there a better post-infinite-mana Animate Dead target than Oona? I don't think I ever want her in my hand..

Do I need to play as many counterspells as I have in here?

Do I really want to play Mesmeric Orb? Sure it can pretty much cause me to win if I have a Fatestitcher and some mana, but it feels pretty bad otherwise.

So...I'll try to answer these questions after testing some more and playing in some games.

The deck so far:


One thing occured to me too: Stensia Bloodhall and Nephalia Drownyard are pretty cool win conditions (similar to the Piranah Marsh) if you have them in play with a continually dying Worldgorger.
The soon to be released Desolate Lighthouse is nice too, to dig for that Comet Storm.

Quote from luminum can

I'd play Slice In Twain before playing Rending Vines. Saving one mana doesn't seem worth the awkwardness of not having enough cards in hand to deal with a permanent that you really want gone.

I think I'm going to try both as replacements for some of my other artifact/enchantment destruction. I figure much of the time I'll just be destroying a mana rock or something, so Rending Vines should be pretty decent.

Quote from Lithl

Does cycling Decree of Annihilation count as a cantrip?

Haha, ya know, I think it does.
I actually took out a lot of the land desctuction I had in the deck to focus more on hasty, trampling damage in 1v1 games.
After playing with and liking Explore and Smash, I wanted to try and fit as many useful cantrips as possible in. Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be very many useful ones in these colors.

Thanks for the ideas so far.

Manamorphose seems good in the right deck, like maybe an Animar combo deck. But do you think it would be worth a slot in Radha? Seems like I'd rather play cards that do something besides filter through my deck.

I don't think Ground Seal will be useful in this deck, but it's something I should keep in mind for my Karador deck, actually. Thanks for that.

I think I'm going to try out
Wildsize
Provoke
Rending Vines
and possibly Masked Admirers.

Can anyone recommend any good GR cantrips?

I'm looking to add some more to my Radha deck.
I currently have Explore and Smash in the deck and have liked the fact that they replace themselves.
I'm thinking about adding Slice in Twain but I'm not sure if the mana cost is worth it.

The problem is playing it so early. You're going to be the obvious target if you play it turn 2 while everyone else is still setting up. If you play it later, it's probably not going to draw quite as much attention.

I've only really used it in enchantment-based decks though, where I can set up Solitary Confinement and other protection first.