For simplicity's sake I'm choosing Elvish Mystic as the example but in reality I'm referring to all of the generic 1 CMC mana dorks such as Birds of Paradise, Noble Hierarch and Deathrite Shaman. Furthermore, for the purposes of my discussion I'm not considering Joraga Treespeaker which is a significantly more powerful card that legitimately needs to be killed early.
While I've always defaulted to durable rampers such as Utopia Sprawl in the past as Wizards continues to reward player for fielding creature-based decks (Kessig Wolf Run, Survival of the Fittest, Birthing Pod, Lurking Predators) I'm starting to wonder if it isn't time to make the switch back over to traditional creatures instead. I know that many people have come to fear the age old mantra of "Bolt the Bird" but I personally think that those concerns are wildly overblown in a multiplayer setting. While I recognize that every meta is different I personally haven't witnessed a pattern of cheap mana dorks being targeted by spot removal early on when playing against "seasoned" multiplayer enthusiasts. Multiplayer decks tend to run less spot removal in general and, more importantly, it has significantly more worth than it does in duels. Magic is filled with 4+ CMC critters that can end games if left unchecked (Crypt Ghast, Master Transmuter, Oracle of Mul Daya) and the value of being able to flash spot removal at would-be attackers is immeasurable. From a purely "I want to win games" perspective I think that it's basically just outright wrong to "waste" removal on insignificant threats and I personally don't feel as though fair mana dorks qualify. That player is still going to be able to cast his or her spells and even though it'll happen at a slower rate you've just used one of your few removal spells, a precious, non-recurring resource, to hinder a single opponent. You're not suddenly in a prime position to win the game but you could easily go on to lose to some big dumb fatty because you basically blew your best line of defense against it. People would much rather keep that Swords to Plowshares to flash to the person who jams an early 5/5 in order to provide them with an incentive to send it elsewhere. Furthermore, you're almost always always going to need that removal spell in the later stages of the game when haymakers are flying left and right and someone is going for a game-winning line. If you can't fizzle that Rite of Replication on turn 7 then you're going to lose the game outright and it's not as though killing a dork on T1 is going to cement a victory. Games go long and people tend to do powerful things so it makes no strategic sense (in my mind) to blow your removal unless it's absolutely needed. My playgroups seem to agree with me in general because I basically can't the remember the last time a cheap dork elicited an immediate response.
I want to stress that the primary reason why killing dorks is "wrong" is because Magic is no longer a game of spells where creatures are all worthless do-nothings. Crypt Ghast dies to removal BUT YOU ACTUALLY NEED THE REMOVAL SPELL for it or you lose. There's no game, no decision-making, you just lose to the person who has access to 10 mana on turn 5 and it only gets worse from there. That's why I don't really understand why people argue that a Nantuko Shade (or whatever) can just get picked-off at no benefit. Who the Hell is actually killing these 1-3 CMC critters that aren't making offensive moves? People are actively using removal to kill threats that aren't threatening to end games, that aren't hindering their gameplan, that aren't doing anything but sitting back on D and/or providing a benefit to their owner? That's not what I see when I play Cube, Commander, Constructed, you name it. Creatures are really frikkin strong nowadays and you can't just blow your limited removal on dumb little blockers and dorks. Unless a card is legitimately threatening someone I almost never see them go out of their way to kill a creature that isn't threatening to do something ridiculously degenerate.
Some people may argue that being "fast out of the gates" is a bad thing but I've personally haven't witnessed this myself in a very long time. Maybe it's because my playgroup has played Cube/EDH so much but in general fair, early ramp doesn't ring any alarm bells nor trigger any reaction from players. It's just "the norm;" something that you should expect to see a fair amount in multiplayer. People don't often start on turn 1, more often than not you see activity on 2 or 3, but it's not as though the person starting on 1 is heavily advantaged because even if they proceed to dump their hand they're probably just going to lose to a mass removal spell anyways. Being the first "big mover" is almost never a winning line to take because everyone still has all of their resources so the concept that a fast start should "draw hate" just doesn't resonate with what I've personally experienced. A turn 1 dork is only marginally better than a turn 2 Signet (or whatever) and not something that people seem to fret over.
With respect to creatures being vulnerable to mass removal, this is why I never liked them in the first place. As a mono-Black player myself I used to look at Green decks as gimmies because as long as you packed 3-4x Innocent Blood, 4x Damnation, 2x Massacre and 4x Phyrexian Arenas for card draw you couldn't really lose to anyone who opened with a Forest. It helped that the White decks all had 4x Swords to Plowshares and 4x Wrath of God, that the Red decks all had 4x Earthquake, etc. but the point is that for many, many years you wouldn't catch me dead running something with 4x Llanowar Elves in it. Still, I've personally witness a trend of people moving away from mass removal in their decks (even in formats such as EDH) now that Wizards has made an active effort to ensure that creatures can be relevant threats. With every Thragtusk and Primeval Titan that they ship our way reactive removal looks worse and worse and so modern day decks tend to feature far more creatures and, as a result, tend to cut back on mass removal given that it's often counter-active to their deck's primary gameplan. It's not that Day of Judgment got worse, it's as good as its ever been, it's just people want to play with creatures and since killing your own isn't fun/appealing people have fewer incentives to jam 4+ into every single White deck that they build.
What I'm attempting to glean from this thread is people's "competitive" experiences with cheap dorks such as Elvish Mystic (playing with or against is obviously fine). Again, I legitimately believe that it's actively bad to kill them and at least for me and my meta that seems to be the prevailing opinion because I haven't seen a Birds of Paradise eat a crucial defensive spell such as Swords to Plowshares in a very long time. Given that people are also moving away from mass removal in general it occurs to me that now is probably the time the start whipping them out.
I'm pleased to see a sub-discussion from another thread make it to the main stage.
The two casual groups I've played in for the past few years are mostly comprised of only 1-2 other highly competitive players (besides me) and the rest are there to play with their barely cohesive decks that still run gates, temples, and expanse/wilds for color fixing. Consequently, anyone who drops three cards on turn one is immediately seen as a high threat. Playing only a land is normal and a land + another permanent is moderate threat. Less competent players evaluate my board state as if we are in a duel, not as if we are in a political game with other people who can also potentially deal with anything I put on the battlefield.
That being said, I think the Elvish Mystic types are not worth playing because of mass removal. They may get me the mana I need on turns 4-5, but then I lose them and the thing I wanted to cast from spot/mass removal.
In my opinion, the best option right now is Sylvan Caryatid because it at least evades spot removal and fixes all colors. Caryatid also requires more than one Massacre Wurm to remove or similar uses of -x/-x spells and abilities. If I'm going to ramp, I want lands or huge effects like Nykthos, Coffers, or creature mana doublers like Crypt Ghast.
That being said, I think the Elvish Mystic types are not worth playing because of mass removal.
In my opinion, the best option right now is Sylvan Caryatid...
Not the conclusion I was expecting to hear given the premise. As I said in the OP, I only used Elvish Mystic as a convenience example. Birds of Paradise is a perfectly reasonable alternative that also color fixes for all 5 colors. It costs less (both in terms of $ and CMC) and while it's certainly a weaker body aggro decks are A) fairly weak in multiplayer in general and B) very bad against ramp decks in general. Are people in your meta mostly playing "Massacre" effects that deal with <= 2 toughness creatures? I obviously I agree that 1 CMC mana dorks are bad against mass removal but the same is usually also true of Caryatid. Neither is an appealing option in the face of a turn 3-4 "Wrath of God" so it strikes me as odd that you would condemn one and praise the other. Since my OP was kind of long-winded, I guess the question I have for you is "do people actually use spot removal on the BoP?" Again, my basic observation/hypothesis/premise/argument is that it's rather silly to waste removal on trivial threats and that both cards are equally bad against most forms of mass removal. Obviously if your meta is facing down nothing but Massacre Wurm and other similar effects then that'll dramatically shift things but I'm not looking for a perfect solution that will work for 100% of players and metas. If it's a simple matter of starting on turn 1 vs starting on turn 2, if that's the major consideration that needs to be made, then the winner is clear as far as I'm concerned. Again, I recognize that different cards will yield different results in different metas, I'm just wondering if "Bolt the Bird" is true for anyone. If it's not then I see very little reason to continue to hate on them insofar as your meta isn't crawling with mass removal (which, again, appears to be more and more of them, at least from what I've observed). Again, I want to stress that I'm not trying to convince you to use BoP if every Black deck in your area has Massacre Wurm or whatever. I'm trying to look beyond specific metas to assess the card's overall worth in the global multiplayer sphere. Have you recently played with/against targetable mana dorks and seen players actively remove them with spot removal?
Unless someone has an active Goblin Sharpshooter or other machinegun. In that case they do get picked off.
But we're pretty friendly towards other players manabases that's probably less in other groups.
But even when we're playing for the win we probably won't waste a card to kill a mana dork.
(funnily enough I just added 4 BoP's to my deck for the first time in six years)
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My meta: 3 or 4 player free for all, anything goes but boring games or broken decks cause a vote to end that game.
No... People leave mana dorks alone. In fact, if someone wasted spot removal on my BoP, I would be pretty stoked.
I have a slightly different outlook on those kinds of incidents. I'm never stoked to trade resources off with another player, all things being equal I'd rather we both preserve our cards, but I am happy to see people "waste removal" in general. It's a statistical thing where you say to yourself "as long as I'm only on the receiving end 1/Nth of the time then the other N-1/N % of the time I get to play against people who're down removal and early threats. In that sense I'm more excited about "games to come" than I am "present games." While I agree that it's nice to "soak" some removal for your future threats the reality is that if your opponents have good decks with good cards you have fallen behind at no benefit so there's basically no realistic way to argue that you benefited from the exchange. The person who cast the removal spell came out the worst, you came out slightly above him and everyone else came out on top have expended nothing to get a free advantage over both of you.
No... People leave mana dorks alone. In fact, if someone wasted spot removal on my BoP, I would be pretty stoked.
I have a slightly different outlook on those kinds of incidents. I'm never stoked to trade resources off with another player, all things being equal I'd rather we both preserve our cards, but I am happy to see people "waste removal" in general. It's a statistical thing where you say to yourself "as long as I'm only on the receiving end 1/Nth of the time then the other N-1/N % of the time I get to play against people who're down removal and early threats. In that sense I'm more excited about "games to come" than I am "present games." While I agree that it's nice to "soak" some removal for your future threats the reality is that if your opponents have good decks with good cards you have fallen behind at no benefit so there's basically no realistic way to argue that you benefited from the exchange. The person who cast the removal spell came out the worst, you came out slightly above him and everyone else came out on top have expended nothing to get a free advantage over both of you.
I meant to write "spot removal on A BoP," so yeah...
Although, if I had to choose between losing a Bird now, or a Titan later, I would chose the bird every time.
But the point is: in my experience, people want to win, so nobody is casting Swords on a mana dork.
Yea, this clears up the intention. To answer the intended question, no, people aren't using spot removal to purposefully remove 1CMC mana dorks, but if the spot removal is scattered then they get hit as easy targets. Basically the same as the others described. In my meta it seems -x/-x spells and abilities are prevalent right now and board sweepers tend to get countered, so something bigger than x/2 lasts longer and provides more value when the game is going 10-15 turns.
If anything, dropping too many mana dorks and starting from turn 1 means people hold their removal to hit you with it when you ramp out your early threat. Not using mana dorks or waiting a turn later to cast them sometimes lets you fly under the radar.
Heh, it's funny how different some metas can be. I've been playing multiplayer Magic for God knows how many years now and I legitimately can't remember ever seeing a mass removal spell being countered. I'm prone to hyperbole which probably lessens the impact of that statement but this one I'm extremely confident about. Obviously it has something to do with the fact that my games are very big and so it's almost impossible to ever feel "safe" but in general I think that most people would gladly stack the top of someone's library in order to have them draw and cast a Wrath every few circuits of every game. This is especially true for U/x (probably Black or White) Value/Control decks with Counterspells.
This is especially true for U/x (probably Black or White) Value/Control decks with Counterspells.
This is precisely why I run Supreme Verdict and Austere Command almost exclusively in my control decks. I want to guarantee the wipe or at least have the option to get rid of non-creature things that tend to get countered less (the ones playing the annoying arts and chants aren't packing counters).
I've never seen a wrath be countered either. I've seen Boros Charm be cast in response, but that's completely different. In my experience, everyone who uses counterspells is happy to see lots of creatures hit the bin. I would never need to run Sumpreme Verdict, for example. DoJ works everytime.
To me, shooting a dork is a minor tempo play. Spending cards for minor tempo plays against one opponent is really not where you want to be. However, if it is significantly more powerful ramp, like any creature that produces 2+ mana, like Somberwald Sage or the Elfball guys, then you got an incentive to shoot them. The tempo boost these give are just too much.
That being said, my choice of dorks or land search depends on the mana curve. If I have awesome stuff at the 1-3-5 range then I'm more likely to play 1-drop accelerants. Otherwise, if my critical source of mana is #4, I'll opt for land search.
Also, Joraga Treespeaker is definitely a legitimate target. I don't call that card the "Green Sol Ring" for nothing.
I play in a meta where board wipes are pretty normal, there will be a couple per game so ramp in the form of creatures isn't that flash. Sakura-tribe elder, Solemn Simulacrum or Primeval Titan are the only ramp creatures that I would seriously consider.
I also hate the late game draw of a BoP or mystic.
As for removal, I've definatly seen removal on turn 1 BoPs and Joraga Treespeaker. I wouldn't consider a removal spell wasted is it stops the green player ramping to 6 on turn 3. That swords to plowshares starts to look silly when they drop a Garruk, Caller of Beasts before you have any kind of board presence out.
I also hate the late game draw of a BoP or mystic.
Yes, definitely agree.
I mean that's going to be a universal truth for every player in every setting (be it multiplayer or not). Cheap ramp spells are glorified lands and past a certain point they become relatively dead draws. The primary reason to play with them in the first place is if you don't expect the game to go very long to begin with. When your gameplan involves ramping out a Tooth and Nail, Sylvan Primordial or a Genesis Wave (or whatever) then the threat of dead lategame draws is significantly diminished.
I mean that's going to be a universal truth for every player in every setting (be it multiplayer or not). Cheap ramp spells are glorified lands and past a certain point they become relatively dead draws.
Sure, I get that but its just a dirty feeling.
Top decking a BoP does bugger all, best case it's a flying blocker. At least if I top deck a Sakura-tribe Elder I get an additional land out of the block.
Don't get me wrong, I love ramp but its definatly a balancing act between your early and late game. It's one that I struggle with constantly and if I'm ramping into the long game I want my ramp in the form of extra lands that are going to stay around after a wrath.
The primary reason to play with them in the first place is if you don't expect the game to go very long to begin with. When your gameplan involves ramping out a Tooth and Nail, Sylvan Primordial or a Genesis Wave (or whatever) then the threat of dead lategame draws is significantly diminished.
What I really love about multiplayer is that resloving Tooth and Nail, Sylvan Primordial or a Genesis Wave doesn't actually mean you win (at least in my meta). You've either got to think bigger or wider. In my experience if your plan is to ramp and play a bomb you can usually take down one or maybe two people but by the time you turn your attention to player 3 and 4 is that they probably have a solution and you've usually shot your load and have an empty grip.
No... People leave mana dorks alone. In fact, if someone wasted spot removal on my BoP, I would be pretty stoked.
Well, I'd be pretty upset if somebody plowed my bird.
LOL. Well played sir.
For mine, unless you're playing something that makes those manadorks capable of killing in the mid-to-lategame like Craterhoof Behemoth or Beastmaster Ascension, then you're doing it wrong. The whole point of manadork strategy in my mind is to make them a threat, otherwise you should be playing traditional ramp.
I can see a reason to pop Deathrite Shaman into a lot of lists in green and/or black, the card is great in certain builds and is fairly useful at answering opponent graveyard strategy, but if we're just talking straight mana-dorks then I'll stick to my above thought.
For simplicity's sake I'm choosing Elvish Mystic as the example but in reality I'm referring to all of the generic 1 CMC mana dorks such as Birds of Paradise, Noble Hierarch and Deathrite Shaman. Furthermore, for the purposes of my discussion I'm not considering Joraga Treespeaker which is a significantly more powerful card that legitimately needs to be killed early.
While I've always defaulted to durable rampers such as Utopia Sprawl in the past as Wizards continues to reward player for fielding creature-based decks (Kessig Wolf Run, Survival of the Fittest, Birthing Pod, Lurking Predators) I'm starting to wonder if it isn't time to make the switch back over to traditional creatures instead. I know that many people have come to fear the age old mantra of "Bolt the Bird" but I personally think that those concerns are wildly overblown in a multiplayer setting. While I recognize that every meta is different I personally haven't witnessed a pattern of cheap mana dorks being targeted by spot removal early on when playing against "seasoned" multiplayer enthusiasts. Multiplayer decks tend to run less spot removal in general and, more importantly, it has significantly more worth than it does in duels. Magic is filled with 4+ CMC critters that can end games if left unchecked (Crypt Ghast, Master Transmuter, Oracle of Mul Daya) and the value of being able to flash spot removal at would-be attackers is immeasurable. From a purely "I want to win games" perspective I think that it's basically just outright wrong to "waste" removal on insignificant threats and I personally don't feel as though fair mana dorks qualify. That player is still going to be able to cast his or her spells and even though it'll happen at a slower rate you've just used one of your few removal spells, a precious, non-recurring resource, to hinder a single opponent. You're not suddenly in a prime position to win the game but you could easily go on to lose to some big dumb fatty because you basically blew your best line of defense against it. People would much rather keep that Swords to Plowshares to flash to the person who jams an early 5/5 in order to provide them with an incentive to send it elsewhere. Furthermore, you're almost always always going to need that removal spell in the later stages of the game when haymakers are flying left and right and someone is going for a game-winning line. If you can't fizzle that Rite of Replication on turn 7 then you're going to lose the game outright and it's not as though killing a dork on T1 is going to cement a victory. Games go long and people tend to do powerful things so it makes no strategic sense (in my mind) to blow your removal unless it's absolutely needed. My playgroups seem to agree with me in general because I basically can't the remember the last time a cheap dork elicited an immediate response.
I want to stress that the primary reason why killing dorks is "wrong" is because Magic is no longer a game of spells where creatures are all worthless do-nothings. Crypt Ghast dies to removal BUT YOU ACTUALLY NEED THE REMOVAL SPELL for it or you lose. There's no game, no decision-making, you just lose to the person who has access to 10 mana on turn 5 and it only gets worse from there. That's why I don't really understand why people argue that a Nantuko Shade (or whatever) can just get picked-off at no benefit. Who the Hell is actually killing these 1-3 CMC critters that aren't making offensive moves? People are actively using removal to kill threats that aren't threatening to end games, that aren't hindering their gameplan, that aren't doing anything but sitting back on D and/or providing a benefit to their owner? That's not what I see when I play Cube, Commander, Constructed, you name it. Creatures are really frikkin strong nowadays and you can't just blow your limited removal on dumb little blockers and dorks. Unless a card is legitimately threatening someone I almost never see them go out of their way to kill a creature that isn't threatening to do something ridiculously degenerate.
Some people may argue that being "fast out of the gates" is a bad thing but I've personally haven't witnessed this myself in a very long time. Maybe it's because my playgroup has played Cube/EDH so much but in general fair, early ramp doesn't ring any alarm bells nor trigger any reaction from players. It's just "the norm;" something that you should expect to see a fair amount in multiplayer. People don't often start on turn 1, more often than not you see activity on 2 or 3, but it's not as though the person starting on 1 is heavily advantaged because even if they proceed to dump their hand they're probably just going to lose to a mass removal spell anyways. Being the first "big mover" is almost never a winning line to take because everyone still has all of their resources so the concept that a fast start should "draw hate" just doesn't resonate with what I've personally experienced. A turn 1 dork is only marginally better than a turn 2 Signet (or whatever) and not something that people seem to fret over.
With respect to creatures being vulnerable to mass removal, this is why I never liked them in the first place. As a mono-Black player myself I used to look at Green decks as gimmies because as long as you packed 3-4x Innocent Blood, 4x Damnation, 2x Massacre and 4x Phyrexian Arenas for card draw you couldn't really lose to anyone who opened with a Forest. It helped that the White decks all had 4x Swords to Plowshares and 4x Wrath of God, that the Red decks all had 4x Earthquake, etc. but the point is that for many, many years you wouldn't catch me dead running something with 4x Llanowar Elves in it. Still, I've personally witness a trend of people moving away from mass removal in their decks (even in formats such as EDH) now that Wizards has made an active effort to ensure that creatures can be relevant threats. With every Thragtusk and Primeval Titan that they ship our way reactive removal looks worse and worse and so modern day decks tend to feature far more creatures and, as a result, tend to cut back on mass removal given that it's often counter-active to their deck's primary gameplan. It's not that Day of Judgment got worse, it's as good as its ever been, it's just people want to play with creatures and since killing your own isn't fun/appealing people have fewer incentives to jam 4+ into every single White deck that they build.
What I'm attempting to glean from this thread is people's "competitive" experiences with cheap dorks such as Elvish Mystic (playing with or against is obviously fine). Again, I legitimately believe that it's actively bad to kill them and at least for me and my meta that seems to be the prevailing opinion because I haven't seen a Birds of Paradise eat a crucial defensive spell such as Swords to Plowshares in a very long time. Given that people are also moving away from mass removal in general it occurs to me that now is probably the time the start whipping them out.
Guilds of Ravnica - Commander 2018 - Core 2019 - Battlebond - Dominaria - Rivals of Ixalan - Ixalan - Commander 2017 - Hour of Devastation - Amonket - Aether Revolt - Commander 2016 - Kaladesh - Conspiracy 2 - Eldritch Moon - Shadows Over Innistrad - Oath of the Gatewatch - Commander 2015 - Battle for Zendikar - Magic Origins - Dragons of Tarkir
Green - Blue - Red - White - Gold
The two casual groups I've played in for the past few years are mostly comprised of only 1-2 other highly competitive players (besides me) and the rest are there to play with their barely cohesive decks that still run gates, temples, and expanse/wilds for color fixing. Consequently, anyone who drops three cards on turn one is immediately seen as a high threat. Playing only a land is normal and a land + another permanent is moderate threat. Less competent players evaluate my board state as if we are in a duel, not as if we are in a political game with other people who can also potentially deal with anything I put on the battlefield.
That being said, I think the Elvish Mystic types are not worth playing because of mass removal. They may get me the mana I need on turns 4-5, but then I lose them and the thing I wanted to cast from spot/mass removal.
In my opinion, the best option right now is Sylvan Caryatid because it at least evades spot removal and fixes all colors. Caryatid also requires more than one Massacre Wurm to remove or similar uses of -x/-x spells and abilities. If I'm going to ramp, I want lands or huge effects like Nykthos, Coffers, or creature mana doublers like Crypt Ghast.
Not the conclusion I was expecting to hear given the premise. As I said in the OP, I only used Elvish Mystic as a convenience example. Birds of Paradise is a perfectly reasonable alternative that also color fixes for all 5 colors. It costs less (both in terms of $ and CMC) and while it's certainly a weaker body aggro decks are A) fairly weak in multiplayer in general and B) very bad against ramp decks in general. Are people in your meta mostly playing "Massacre" effects that deal with <= 2 toughness creatures? I obviously I agree that 1 CMC mana dorks are bad against mass removal but the same is usually also true of Caryatid. Neither is an appealing option in the face of a turn 3-4 "Wrath of God" so it strikes me as odd that you would condemn one and praise the other. Since my OP was kind of long-winded, I guess the question I have for you is "do people actually use spot removal on the BoP?" Again, my basic observation/hypothesis/premise/argument is that it's rather silly to waste removal on trivial threats and that both cards are equally bad against most forms of mass removal. Obviously if your meta is facing down nothing but Massacre Wurm and other similar effects then that'll dramatically shift things but I'm not looking for a perfect solution that will work for 100% of players and metas. If it's a simple matter of starting on turn 1 vs starting on turn 2, if that's the major consideration that needs to be made, then the winner is clear as far as I'm concerned. Again, I recognize that different cards will yield different results in different metas, I'm just wondering if "Bolt the Bird" is true for anyone. If it's not then I see very little reason to continue to hate on them insofar as your meta isn't crawling with mass removal (which, again, appears to be more and more of them, at least from what I've observed). Again, I want to stress that I'm not trying to convince you to use BoP if every Black deck in your area has Massacre Wurm or whatever. I'm trying to look beyond specific metas to assess the card's overall worth in the global multiplayer sphere. Have you recently played with/against targetable mana dorks and seen players actively remove them with spot removal?
Guilds of Ravnica - Commander 2018 - Core 2019 - Battlebond - Dominaria - Rivals of Ixalan - Ixalan - Commander 2017 - Hour of Devastation - Amonket - Aether Revolt - Commander 2016 - Kaladesh - Conspiracy 2 - Eldritch Moon - Shadows Over Innistrad - Oath of the Gatewatch - Commander 2015 - Battle for Zendikar - Magic Origins - Dragons of Tarkir
Green - Blue - Red - White - Gold
Unless someone has an active Goblin Sharpshooter or other machinegun. In that case they do get picked off.
But we're pretty friendly towards other players manabases that's probably less in other groups.
But even when we're playing for the win we probably won't waste a card to kill a mana dork.
(funnily enough I just added 4 BoP's to my deck for the first time in six years)
My meta: 3 or 4 player free for all, anything goes but boring games or broken decks cause a vote to end that game.
Oh for sure. It would be silly not to direct these towards relevant X/1s.
Guilds of Ravnica - Commander 2018 - Core 2019 - Battlebond - Dominaria - Rivals of Ixalan - Ixalan - Commander 2017 - Hour of Devastation - Amonket - Aether Revolt - Commander 2016 - Kaladesh - Conspiracy 2 - Eldritch Moon - Shadows Over Innistrad - Oath of the Gatewatch - Commander 2015 - Battle for Zendikar - Magic Origins - Dragons of Tarkir
Green - Blue - Red - White - Gold
My Powered 630 card Vintage Multiplayer Cube
cEDH: WUBR Blue Farm WUBR, UG Kinnan Flips UG, U Urza Scepter U
I have a slightly different outlook on those kinds of incidents. I'm never stoked to trade resources off with another player, all things being equal I'd rather we both preserve our cards, but I am happy to see people "waste removal" in general. It's a statistical thing where you say to yourself "as long as I'm only on the receiving end 1/Nth of the time then the other N-1/N % of the time I get to play against people who're down removal and early threats. In that sense I'm more excited about "games to come" than I am "present games." While I agree that it's nice to "soak" some removal for your future threats the reality is that if your opponents have good decks with good cards you have fallen behind at no benefit so there's basically no realistic way to argue that you benefited from the exchange. The person who cast the removal spell came out the worst, you came out slightly above him and everyone else came out on top have expended nothing to get a free advantage over both of you.
Guilds of Ravnica - Commander 2018 - Core 2019 - Battlebond - Dominaria - Rivals of Ixalan - Ixalan - Commander 2017 - Hour of Devastation - Amonket - Aether Revolt - Commander 2016 - Kaladesh - Conspiracy 2 - Eldritch Moon - Shadows Over Innistrad - Oath of the Gatewatch - Commander 2015 - Battle for Zendikar - Magic Origins - Dragons of Tarkir
Green - Blue - Red - White - Gold
I meant to write "spot removal on A BoP," so yeah...
Although, if I had to choose between losing a Bird now, or a Titan later, I would chose the bird every time.
But the point is: in my experience, people want to win, so nobody is casting Swords on a mana dork.
My Powered 630 card Vintage Multiplayer Cube
cEDH: WUBR Blue Farm WUBR, UG Kinnan Flips UG, U Urza Scepter U
If anything, dropping too many mana dorks and starting from turn 1 means people hold their removal to hit you with it when you ramp out your early threat. Not using mana dorks or waiting a turn later to cast them sometimes lets you fly under the radar.
Heh, it's funny how different some metas can be. I've been playing multiplayer Magic for God knows how many years now and I legitimately can't remember ever seeing a mass removal spell being countered. I'm prone to hyperbole which probably lessens the impact of that statement but this one I'm extremely confident about. Obviously it has something to do with the fact that my games are very big and so it's almost impossible to ever feel "safe" but in general I think that most people would gladly stack the top of someone's library in order to have them draw and cast a Wrath every few circuits of every game. This is especially true for U/x (probably Black or White) Value/Control decks with Counterspells.
Guilds of Ravnica - Commander 2018 - Core 2019 - Battlebond - Dominaria - Rivals of Ixalan - Ixalan - Commander 2017 - Hour of Devastation - Amonket - Aether Revolt - Commander 2016 - Kaladesh - Conspiracy 2 - Eldritch Moon - Shadows Over Innistrad - Oath of the Gatewatch - Commander 2015 - Battle for Zendikar - Magic Origins - Dragons of Tarkir
Green - Blue - Red - White - Gold
My Powered 630 card Vintage Multiplayer Cube
cEDH: WUBR Blue Farm WUBR, UG Kinnan Flips UG, U Urza Scepter U
That being said, my choice of dorks or land search depends on the mana curve. If I have awesome stuff at the 1-3-5 range then I'm more likely to play 1-drop accelerants. Otherwise, if my critical source of mana is #4, I'll opt for land search.
Also, Joraga Treespeaker is definitely a legitimate target. I don't call that card the "Green Sol Ring" for nothing.
The Unidentified Fantastic Flying Girl.
EDH
Xenagos, the God of Stompy
The Gitrog Monster: Oppressive Value.
Marchesa, Marionette Master - Undying Robots
Yuriko, the Hydra Omnivore
I make dolls as a hobby.
I also hate the late game draw of a BoP or mystic.
As for removal, I've definatly seen removal on turn 1 BoPs and Joraga Treespeaker. I wouldn't consider a removal spell wasted is it stops the green player ramping to 6 on turn 3. That swords to plowshares starts to look silly when they drop a Garruk, Caller of Beasts before you have any kind of board presence out.
I mean that's going to be a universal truth for every player in every setting (be it multiplayer or not). Cheap ramp spells are glorified lands and past a certain point they become relatively dead draws. The primary reason to play with them in the first place is if you don't expect the game to go very long to begin with. When your gameplan involves ramping out a Tooth and Nail, Sylvan Primordial or a Genesis Wave (or whatever) then the threat of dead lategame draws is significantly diminished.
Guilds of Ravnica - Commander 2018 - Core 2019 - Battlebond - Dominaria - Rivals of Ixalan - Ixalan - Commander 2017 - Hour of Devastation - Amonket - Aether Revolt - Commander 2016 - Kaladesh - Conspiracy 2 - Eldritch Moon - Shadows Over Innistrad - Oath of the Gatewatch - Commander 2015 - Battle for Zendikar - Magic Origins - Dragons of Tarkir
Green - Blue - Red - White - Gold
Sure, I get that but its just a dirty feeling.
Top decking a BoP does bugger all, best case it's a flying blocker. At least if I top deck a Sakura-tribe Elder I get an additional land out of the block.
Don't get me wrong, I love ramp but its definatly a balancing act between your early and late game. It's one that I struggle with constantly and if I'm ramping into the long game I want my ramp in the form of extra lands that are going to stay around after a wrath.
What I really love about multiplayer is that resloving Tooth and Nail, Sylvan Primordial or a Genesis Wave doesn't actually mean you win (at least in my meta). You've either got to think bigger or wider. In my experience if your plan is to ramp and play a bomb you can usually take down one or maybe two people but by the time you turn your attention to player 3 and 4 is that they probably have a solution and you've usually shot your load and have an empty grip.
LOL. Well played sir.
For mine, unless you're playing something that makes those manadorks capable of killing in the mid-to-lategame like Craterhoof Behemoth or Beastmaster Ascension, then you're doing it wrong. The whole point of manadork strategy in my mind is to make them a threat, otherwise you should be playing traditional ramp.
I can see a reason to pop Deathrite Shaman into a lot of lists in green and/or black, the card is great in certain builds and is fairly useful at answering opponent graveyard strategy, but if we're just talking straight mana-dorks then I'll stick to my above thought.
Either to a Skullclamp or to a Minion of Leshrac.
(and none of my other decks run them)
So they're not entirely dead draws.
(And my deck's pretty mana intensive so the late game is pretty late...)
My meta: 3 or 4 player free for all, anything goes but boring games or broken decks cause a vote to end that game.