Well in that case I'd have given you E Wit and Regrowth, so it would be 10 mana.
If I've got a green card to pitch for Ewit, it'd wind up being 7 that way (2 regrowth, 5 dream halls, chuck to ewit, chuck to enter, chuck deck to cast everything, win). So that could be a losing gamble. Either way it's the most "instant win" I can think of that stands a good chance of being faster than Tooth and Nail.
Yes, it's definitely a good card but I really don't think it breaks decks that aren't already broken.
I think it might be a little too strong a tool for control-combo decks. It's a little stronger than Vampiric Tutor because it puts cards in your hand at instant speed, which very few other effects do. Firemind's Foresight is pretty much it that I can think of.
Can you think of another card that gets you a counterspell at instant speed, or fetches combo pieces on endsteps? It does require a little conscious deckbuilding (having multiples of some kinds of effects) but decks do that anyway.
I don't know where you'd look for kitchen table casual decklists. A decent number pop up here but unless they're notably unique and well written they tend to be looked over for more consistent decks.
The reason I don't see his decks as "representative" is because I don't think the biggest chunk of the player base (as in, sitting between newcomers and Spikes) intentionally leaves out the kinds of things that it looks like Sheldon is avoiding. I'd like to reiterate and clarify that I don't think his decks are bad or poorly built in any way. They seem pretty solid overall. To me it's just that he seems to buy the medium popcorn instead of the large. Most players want the large. Spikes want the large in the combo deal with a corndog, drink, free refill, and the frequent buyer punch card. New players don't understand why everyone else is spending so much on popcorn.
That is..... the greatest analogy I've heard in a while.
That is a good gifts pile, however I don't think that LED and company are typically part of "middle-of-the-road" or your average EDH deck that people claim Gifts will have a negative impact on. That looks more like a pile of cards out of a 5C storm deck or something.
I agree. With minimal mana available it very difficult to pull off an auto-win with Gifts assuming no other cards, but that was the challenge that was thrown out there. My point was more along the lines of showing how Gifts wins versus Tooth.
I also don't think you can just drop Gifts into just any deck. If the deck contains no recursion cards then Gifts isn't "Double Demonic Tutor".
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Not only that, but it also doesn't "tutor for two combo pieces and two ways to recur them" making it "a one-card game-ender" which is the reason it was banned. Powerful play, but the RC doesn't ban cards on power.
There are plenty of examples of examples of "two combo pieces and two ways to recur them" out there. One of the more straightforward and cheap ones I can come up with would be Earthcraft, Squirrel Nest, Argivian Find, Rofellos's Gift which would require 7 mana maximum and would be playable by any Bant deck. If you want to stay straight Simic, then replace Argivian Find with Regrowth and it becomes 8 total mana.
Can you think of another card that gets you a counterspell at instant speed, or fetches combo pieces on endsteps? It does require a little conscious deckbuilding (having multiples of some kinds of effects) but decks do that anyway.
Yes, it's definitely a good card but I really don't think it breaks decks that aren't already broken.
I think it might be a little too strong a tool for control-combo decks. It's a little stronger than Vampiric Tutor because it puts cards in your hand at instant speed, which very few other effects do. Firemind's Foresight is pretty much it that I can think of.
Can you think of another card that gets you a counterspell at instant speed, or fetches combo pieces on endsteps? It does require a little conscious deckbuilding (having multiples of some kinds of effects) but decks do that anyway.
Mystical Teachings, Intuition, and Sunforger are the only ones that come to mind. I mostly think of Gifts as a card that provokes clever or skillful deckbuilding and decision making, not nearly as homogenizing as Tooth and Nail or Doomsday piles for sure. d0su puts it best:
What would Gifts add to the format? A splashable, affordable, flexible, skill-testing, FUN tool. Gifts Ungiven is one of the most engaging cards to resolve in MtG, for both sides of the table.
I guess the better way to look at this card is: if it had never been banned... would we even be talking about it here?
I'm probably forgetting others. The list is small and oddly populated.
Of those, only Intuition doubles as "find any combo piece" and it is substantially less powerful because of the inability to chuck two things into the graveyard if desired.
Of those, only Intuition doubles as "find any combo piece" and it is substantially less powerful because of the inability to chuck two things into the graveyard if desired.
Also the fact that it gets one less card and one less card into hand so you can't go two combo pieces plus two recursion pieces - the best you can manage with it is something like Unburial Rites + two dudes who can combo or Mystic Retrieval plus two spells that can combo.
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The challenge was: Cast gifts, untap, win with less mana than Tooth & Nail. Other dependencies kept to an absolute minimum. I think my Dream Halls/Enter the Infinite combo is the closest so far without being extremely convoluted, but even that's only barely so and requires some other colored cards in hand.
Based on all the exercises, I think that Gifts would probably be used as a generic card that is uniquely both a threat and an answer in most blue decks (but probably not all).
The more "friendly" uses I can see for it:
* Sticking a turn 3 or 4 Avacyn off of Unburial Rites.
* Filling your yard with powerful flashback cards
* Getting answers at instant speed
* Fetching a bunch of strong enchantments or artifacts to fuel an Open the Vaults or Replenish
* Grabbing four time magic spells and hoping for the best
* Grabbing four planeswalkers and hoping for the best
* Grabbing four instant draw spells
* Grabbing Archaeomancer, Izzet Chronarch, Mnemonic Wall and some recurring blink effect (Venser, Conjurer's Closet) so you gifts every turn
* Fetching a bunch of graveyard shenanigan guys like Bloodghast
After all that, I kinda think it should be unbanned. Sounds like a ton of fun
The biggest "casual" risk I see is that Gifts makes a lot of opening hands way better than they would otherwise be, so might make decks really a lot more consistent. You can Gifts for your engine and get to playing a consistent game.
With a combo that would not have succeeded with a 6 lands+Vampiric Tutor starting hand.
Without the last qualifier, the previously stated 5 mana pile of Hermit Druid, Lightning Mauler, Reanimate, Entomb works, but 5 Swamp + Bayou + Vampiric Tutor wins with the same combo two turns earlier.
Yeah, I mean, I'm the guy who'd jam it in a deck with Life from the Loam and cycling lands.
I want Gifts to be legal just for that, and to put in Mimeoplasm.
I want Gifts legal because I mostly build dredge lists, and access to Gifts would help things like Temur dredge that are currently missing a little bit of the necessary support to be solid.
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Rest in RIP My Signature, I guess. 2015-2016, we hardly knew ye.
Total side note but I like how people are discussing running this over itself.
Well, it has to be said that Kolaghan is clearly better than Kolaghan. Considering what BR decks usually want and how stiff the competition in this guild is, there is no way that I would run Kolaghan over Kolaghan! Kolaghan might make it in as the sixth guild card or so. Kolaghan on the other hand ranks several places below that.
It was so funny to me when they described this as a downgrade to the original Zurgo during the Pax East panel. I was thinking if this is a downgrade, they should really "downgrade" all legendary creatures. Haha.
My deck designing is quite concise at this point:
1. Come up with deck idea
2. Realize this idea is somehow fundamentally similar to another deck I have or that is commonly played in my group
3. Decide I don't want to disassemble one of my existing decks
4. Give up and do nothing
I don't see the point of this new shroud mechanic. It's strictly worse than Hexproof. Threshold is pretty bad too, Delirium is a much better mechanic and probably easier to activate.
Otherwise this card is a pretty neat guy. Dodges removal and grows into a Primal Huntbeast. 3/5
If gifts got unbanned I'd finally go out of the way to rework my Edric deck into dredge so it's interesting. And probably finish remaking Melek.
I'm not really opposed to it being unbanned, for kind of the same reasons that I think Painter and maybe Mirror should come off the list, but I don't really care if it stays on either.
So, Survival of the Fittest got brought back up on the official forums, and there was some interesting discussion on both sides. I'm interested in hearing your thoughts. Here is the link to the thread itself, while the argument of the opening post is this:
1. Running Survival leads decks to often (as a high majority of witnessed events) to be "toolbox/goodstuff" decks or "dedicated combo" decks. In as such, the roll of Survival of the Fittest in these decks is to bring about a series of moments (repeated discard, and search) that are similar to previous games.
2. Survival is a "repetitive" tutor, it requires the constant searching and shuffling of decks. It goes against the "spirit" of this format, which is supposed to be high-variance, and replaces it with uniformity and consistency.
3. Decks with Survival vs. decks without Survival tends to be a lopsided battle if the Survival player has any amount of decent skill in piloting their deck. Due to its ability to find any creature-based answer, it is a card that can single handedly win the game from a losing position.
4. It is not a healthy card, it is a "degenerate" fun card for people that use it, and it leads to degenerate and unfun games - it is especially "stupid" in Karador decks, and in Karador decks leads to incredibly high "sameness" in the games in which Karador is featured. "Tutor for Survival, play survival, grab required 'answer.'"
5. It is incredibly boring for the opponents to watch someone "Survival" over and over again. It requires a considerable amount of time to search and shuffle
6. Utterly breaks the "lack of consistency" on which this format is styled to be towards.
Counter-arguments:
1. Other tutors are legal. - And other tutors are usually single-use, require large quantities of mana, and are slow.
2. It doesn't instantly win the game as said above. - Neither did Sylvan Primordial or Prime Time or Prophet of Kuphrix - what it does do, is provide an expertly sharpened edge to win with. Many cards that are banned aren't just combo pieces, Bargain on its own does nothing but draw cards; but it does so in such a fantastic way that it abuses the system of the format (40 life.)
3. Many players are self-regulating and don't play it anyway. - And many players are incapable of self-regulating or house-ruling, and as such don't care how powerful and oppressive card is, the duty of the RC is to enforce the notion of a "social" format based on the highlander principles. And, also im my opinion, would create a healthier experience for "non-competitive" players in general.
4. 1v1 blah-blah-blah. - This isn't a 1v1 Discussion; or the 1v1 Forum; or the 1v1 Rules Committee.
5. Price? - Price is not a relevant factor in the discussion of a card needing to be banned or not.
6. Not every green deck plays it. - Not every Green deck needs to play it; but that is a point in favor against it's banning, HOWEVER consideration must be given to WHEN it shows up, and how it affects the game when it does.
Well, the only way I ever bothered with Survival, I only need one creature. I play it in reanimator and just dump a ton of dudes rapid fire. Yeah, it's not the greatest idea ever, but I really like the huge, haymaker plays that don't necessarily work out so well every time. When I do win games it typically ends in epic fashion, though, with just about every deck I have. OF course, I just realized last night that Dragonlord Kolaghan is the best deck for Minion of the Wastes. I've been waiting for years to make that card passable and thinking about Maelstrom and the hilariously named Trench Gorger got me thinking about that.
I actually don't really see what's the big deal with Panoptic Mirror. Sure, it can do everything, but the stuff it can do is extremely overcosted and can usually be done much more efficiently. The only thing you can really do a good job of with it is piss off the whole table. I mean if you're looking for sick card advantage for Tooth mana range, the Force cycle no one plays already does that. (I'm talking about Verdant Force) Most of them do a way better job than most cards on Mirror if they live a turn cycle and you get a free 7/7. If you're looking for infinite combo wins, you can do it for a lot cheaper than 10 mana and a whole turn cycle. The card is a silly garbage rare that was banned ages ago back when I had Searing Wind in a deck.
I'm not really sure why Painter's Servant either. Other than Grindstone and Iona, I don't think does anything else that isn't pretty neat. I doubt anyone could possibly think Iona would be fun and I don't think Grindstone is even halfway playable without it.
Oh, and as for the Gifts pile with Enter the Infinite, it's disqualified by me on the grounds that there's almost no way you can play that card or Dream Halls in a non-combo way. Seriously, Dream Halls is incredibly awful unless you're comboing with it and I don't think there are any non-instant win combo uses for Enter unless you're abusing its high mana cost.
"While YMMV, excessive tutoring and hyperconsistency is not what we envision for the format. Having good tutors legal put too much pressure on deckbuilders to include them. As such, we are adding one of them to the ban list. We trust this will solve the issue.
So, Survival of the Fittest got brought back up on the official forums, and there was some interesting discussion on both sides. I'm interested in hearing your thoughts. Here is the link to the thread itself, while the argument of the opening post is this:
1. Running Survival leads decks to often (as a high majority of witnessed events) to be "toolbox/goodstuff" decks or "dedicated combo" decks. In as such, the roll of Survival of the Fittest in these decks is to bring about a series of moments (repeated discard, and search) that are similar to previous games.
2. Survival is a "repetitive" tutor, it requires the constant searching and shuffling of decks. It goes against the "spirit" of this format, which is supposed to be high-variance, and replaces it with uniformity and consistency.
3. Decks with Survival vs. decks without Survival tends to be a lopsided battle if the Survival player has any amount of decent skill in piloting their deck. Due to its ability to find any creature-based answer, it is a card that can single handedly win the game from a losing position.
4. It is not a healthy card, it is a "degenerate" fun card for people that use it, and it leads to degenerate and unfun games - it is especially "stupid" in Karador decks, and in Karador decks leads to incredibly high "sameness" in the games in which Karador is featured. "Tutor for Survival, play survival, grab required 'answer.'"
5. It is incredibly boring for the opponents to watch someone "Survival" over and over again. It requires a considerable amount of time to search and shuffle
6. Utterly breaks the "lack of consistency" on which this format is styled to be towards.
Counter-arguments:
1. Other tutors are legal. - And other tutors are usually single-use, require large quantities of mana, and are slow.
2. It doesn't instantly win the game as said above. - Neither did Sylvan Primordial or Prime Time or Prophet of Kuphrix - what it does do, is provide an expertly sharpened edge to win with. Many cards that are banned aren't just combo pieces, Bargain on its own does nothing but draw cards; but it does so in such a fantastic way that it abuses the system of the format (40 life.)
3. Many players are self-regulating and don't play it anyway. - And many players are incapable of self-regulating or house-ruling, and as such don't care how powerful and oppressive card is, the duty of the RC is to enforce the notion of a "social" format based on the highlander principles. And, also im my opinion, would create a healthier experience for "non-competitive" players in general.
4. 1v1 blah-blah-blah. - This isn't a 1v1 Discussion; or the 1v1 Forum; or the 1v1 Rules Committee.
5. Price? - Price is not a relevant factor in the discussion of a card needing to be banned or not.
6. Not every green deck plays it. - Not every Green deck needs to play it; but that is a point in favor against it's banning, HOWEVER consideration must be given to WHEN it shows up, and how it affects the game when it does.
My own thoughts on Survival:
1) it belongs in very specific decks which are generally the 20-25+ creature decks. If you don't have creatures in hand you cant toolbox them away. I don't feel it is a staple of green so much as a strong consideration card when playing the colors.
2) Players who are going to play combo will play combo regardless. I don't feel like the fact that a card can be used for combo is a reason to think that players prone to playing combo wont play combo with or without it.
My own experience with Survival have been that it is less harmful than Necropotence and similar to it in a lot of ways. It hits play and immediately can generate its value if it is not countered and it provides value the longer it stays in play. Necro on the other hand fits in like every deck regardless of what is being played so I think its actually the more harmful card of the two.
It has actually been sort of a long time since I have seen anyone play survival in some way I feel has broken the game to be honest.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
One last word about Gifts though: it seemed like we were all pretty much in agreement. I really hope that someone from the RC took note and will begin testing it out. So far, it's worked best in my Sidisi deck, but functions pretty much like Entomb there.
"We can always reverse it at a later date" is NEVER a discussion that we have. While we acknowledge that we can, we don't want to do anything timidly. Additionally, the confusion it would cause would be awful (which is why we don't do anything on a trial basis). Our attitude is "right now, this is the what we see as the best (decision, banning, whatever) for the format and its future." Sure, the future may change stuff; we'll adjust appropriately if need be.
I definitely think Survival falls under the "extremely powerful, broken in some circumstances, but not quite banworthy with the current philosophy" camp.
I don't think it is fundamentally any better than a huge raft of similar oldschool high powered cards.
The only times I have seen it be immensely abusive these days are combined with Prophet of Kruphix, but obviously it's very good at finding combo pieces--but so are all tutors.
If I've got a green card to pitch for Ewit, it'd wind up being 7 that way (2 regrowth, 5 dream halls, chuck to ewit, chuck to enter, chuck deck to cast everything, win). So that could be a losing gamble. Either way it's the most "instant win" I can think of that stands a good chance of being faster than Tooth and Nail.
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I think it might be a little too strong a tool for control-combo decks. It's a little stronger than Vampiric Tutor because it puts cards in your hand at instant speed, which very few other effects do. Firemind's Foresight is pretty much it that I can think of.
Can you think of another card that gets you a counterspell at instant speed, or fetches combo pieces on endsteps? It does require a little conscious deckbuilding (having multiples of some kinds of effects) but decks do that anyway.
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That is..... the greatest analogy I've heard in a while.
@ProfessonWhen - thanks for the decklist.
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I agree. With minimal mana available it very difficult to pull off an auto-win with Gifts assuming no other cards, but that was the challenge that was thrown out there. My point was more along the lines of showing how Gifts wins versus Tooth.
I also don't think you can just drop Gifts into just any deck. If the deck contains no recursion cards then Gifts isn't "Double Demonic Tutor".
There are plenty of examples of examples of "two combo pieces and two ways to recur them" out there. One of the more straightforward and cheap ones I can come up with would be Earthcraft, Squirrel Nest, Argivian Find, Rofellos's Gift which would require 7 mana maximum and would be playable by any Bant deck. If you want to stay straight Simic, then replace Argivian Find with Regrowth and it becomes 8 total mana.
Other instant tutors for counterspells include:
Intuition
Mystical Teachings
Trapmaker's Snare - For Mindbreak Trap in this specific case.
I'm probably forgetting others. The list is small and oddly populated.
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But surely you run Mobilize?
Of those, only Intuition doubles as "find any combo piece" and it is substantially less powerful because of the inability to chuck two things into the graveyard if desired.
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StaffAlso the fact that it gets one less card and one less card into hand so you can't go two combo pieces plus two recursion pieces - the best you can manage with it is something like Unburial Rites + two dudes who can combo or Mystic Retrieval plus two spells that can combo.
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I want Gifts to be legal just for that, and to put in Mimeoplasm.
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The challenge was: Cast gifts, untap, win with less mana than Tooth & Nail. Other dependencies kept to an absolute minimum. I think my Dream Halls/Enter the Infinite combo is the closest so far without being extremely convoluted, but even that's only barely so and requires some other colored cards in hand.
Based on all the exercises, I think that Gifts would probably be used as a generic card that is uniquely both a threat and an answer in most blue decks (but probably not all).
The more "friendly" uses I can see for it:
* Sticking a turn 3 or 4 Avacyn off of Unburial Rites.
* Filling your yard with powerful flashback cards
* Getting answers at instant speed
* Fetching a bunch of strong enchantments or artifacts to fuel an Open the Vaults or Replenish
* Grabbing four time magic spells and hoping for the best
* Grabbing four planeswalkers and hoping for the best
* Grabbing four instant draw spells
* Grabbing Archaeomancer, Izzet Chronarch, Mnemonic Wall and some recurring blink effect (Venser, Conjurer's Closet) so you gifts every turn
* Fetching a bunch of graveyard shenanigan guys like Bloodghast
After all that, I kinda think it should be unbanned. Sounds like a ton of fun
The biggest "casual" risk I see is that Gifts makes a lot of opening hands way better than they would otherwise be, so might make decks really a lot more consistent. You can Gifts for your engine and get to playing a consistent game.
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
Without the last qualifier, the previously stated 5 mana pile of Hermit Druid, Lightning Mauler, Reanimate, Entomb works, but 5 Swamp + Bayou + Vampiric Tutor wins with the same combo two turns earlier.
I want Gifts legal because I mostly build dredge lists, and access to Gifts would help things like Temur dredge that are currently missing a little bit of the necessary support to be solid.
I'm not really opposed to it being unbanned, for kind of the same reasons that I think Painter and maybe Mirror should come off the list, but I don't really care if it stays on either.
2. Survival is a "repetitive" tutor, it requires the constant searching and shuffling of decks. It goes against the "spirit" of this format, which is supposed to be high-variance, and replaces it with uniformity and consistency.
3. Decks with Survival vs. decks without Survival tends to be a lopsided battle if the Survival player has any amount of decent skill in piloting their deck. Due to its ability to find any creature-based answer, it is a card that can single handedly win the game from a losing position.
4. It is not a healthy card, it is a "degenerate" fun card for people that use it, and it leads to degenerate and unfun games - it is especially "stupid" in Karador decks, and in Karador decks leads to incredibly high "sameness" in the games in which Karador is featured. "Tutor for Survival, play survival, grab required 'answer.'"
5. It is incredibly boring for the opponents to watch someone "Survival" over and over again. It requires a considerable amount of time to search and shuffle
6. Utterly breaks the "lack of consistency" on which this format is styled to be towards.
Counter-arguments:
1. Other tutors are legal. - And other tutors are usually single-use, require large quantities of mana, and are slow.
2. It doesn't instantly win the game as said above. - Neither did Sylvan Primordial or Prime Time or Prophet of Kuphrix - what it does do, is provide an expertly sharpened edge to win with. Many cards that are banned aren't just combo pieces, Bargain on its own does nothing but draw cards; but it does so in such a fantastic way that it abuses the system of the format (40 life.)
3. Many players are self-regulating and don't play it anyway. - And many players are incapable of self-regulating or house-ruling, and as such don't care how powerful and oppressive card is, the duty of the RC is to enforce the notion of a "social" format based on the highlander principles. And, also im my opinion, would create a healthier experience for "non-competitive" players in general.
4. 1v1 blah-blah-blah. - This isn't a 1v1 Discussion; or the 1v1 Forum; or the 1v1 Rules Committee.
5. Price? - Price is not a relevant factor in the discussion of a card needing to be banned or not.
6. Not every green deck plays it. - Not every Green deck needs to play it; but that is a point in favor against it's banning, HOWEVER consideration must be given to WHEN it shows up, and how it affects the game when it does.
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I actually don't really see what's the big deal with Panoptic Mirror. Sure, it can do everything, but the stuff it can do is extremely overcosted and can usually be done much more efficiently. The only thing you can really do a good job of with it is piss off the whole table. I mean if you're looking for sick card advantage for Tooth mana range, the Force cycle no one plays already does that. (I'm talking about Verdant Force) Most of them do a way better job than most cards on Mirror if they live a turn cycle and you get a free 7/7. If you're looking for infinite combo wins, you can do it for a lot cheaper than 10 mana and a whole turn cycle. The card is a silly garbage rare that was banned ages ago back when I had Searing Wind in a deck.
I'm not really sure why Painter's Servant either. Other than Grindstone and Iona, I don't think does anything else that isn't pretty neat. I doubt anyone could possibly think Iona would be fun and I don't think Grindstone is even halfway playable without it.
Oh, and as for the Gifts pile with Enter the Infinite, it's disqualified by me on the grounds that there's almost no way you can play that card or Dream Halls in a non-combo way. Seriously, Dream Halls is incredibly awful unless you're comboing with it and I don't think there are any non-instant win combo uses for Enter unless you're abusing its high mana cost.
"While YMMV, excessive tutoring and hyperconsistency is not what we envision for the format. Having good tutors legal put too much pressure on deckbuilders to include them. As such, we are adding one of them to the ban list. We trust this will solve the issue.
We can always remove it at a later date."
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My own thoughts on Survival:
1) it belongs in very specific decks which are generally the 20-25+ creature decks. If you don't have creatures in hand you cant toolbox them away. I don't feel it is a staple of green so much as a strong consideration card when playing the colors.
2) Players who are going to play combo will play combo regardless. I don't feel like the fact that a card can be used for combo is a reason to think that players prone to playing combo wont play combo with or without it.
My own experience with Survival have been that it is less harmful than Necropotence and similar to it in a lot of ways. It hits play and immediately can generate its value if it is not countered and it provides value the longer it stays in play. Necro on the other hand fits in like every deck regardless of what is being played so I think its actually the more harmful card of the two.
It has actually been sort of a long time since I have seen anyone play survival in some way I feel has broken the game to be honest.
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One last word about Gifts though: it seemed like we were all pretty much in agreement. I really hope that someone from the RC took note and will begin testing it out.
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I don't think it is fundamentally any better than a huge raft of similar oldschool high powered cards.
It definitely fails the Tooth & Nail metric, and probably isn't any more powerful than Birthing pod, Green Sun's Zenith or Chord of Calling in general terms.
The only times I have seen it be immensely abusive these days are combined with Prophet of Kruphix, but obviously it's very good at finding combo pieces--but so are all tutors.
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall