Had a shared victory and a straight win with an RB aggro deck that surprised me.
Shared win: An opposing Rouse the Souls cantrip deck with Intangible Virtue casts Rouse (1 of 7+ copies in the deck).
- Parley reveals my Volcanic Fallout. I have a second one in hand. He cannot kill me despite my low life else I wipe his army. He cannot cast Virtue or Favorable Winds else I wipe.
- He casts Altar of Dementia. I have 4+ Shatter Devils in my deck. I allow Altar to resolve and he knows as soon as it mills me a card, I will Fallout.
- Game progresses he is reduced to 1 damage. Another player is around 20 life with reach defense. By accord, the Rouser mills that player for 14 and we share the win.
Some players may not like the hostage shared victory, but we had fun with it.
The game came down to a crucial turn where one guy used Rout at instant speed to clear the board and I had a Wrap in Vigor to save my board which was pretty decent.
Not that it matters now, but I suppose you both missed the "can't be regenerated" clause.
Yeah, I opened up a prize pack when I got home and pulled one and as I was putting it into one of my EDH techs I noticed the can't be regenerated clause. Whoops. I don't know how all four of us in the pod missed that haha.
Naya Tokens/Defenders is the best stupid deck I've ever drafted (or at least it was the first time I drafted it, once people knew the strategy it got weaker). Revealing six lands and that 1/5 spider in my opening hand won me a game. It was hillarious.
I'll probably be going for a third draft this weekend, and I've made it my mission to draft something new. Maybe Izzet/Grixis Dethrone? Even if I don't pull a Marchesa it should be a pretty good deck base.
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“Tell me who you walk with, and I'll tell you who you are.” Esmeralda Santiago Art is life itself.
I'll probably be going for a third draft this weekend, and I've made it my mission to draft something new. Maybe Izzet/Grixis Dethrone? Even if I don't pull a Marchesa it should be a pretty good deck base.
That's what I like about the format. So many different ways to go about the draft. Now that I have some experience with the format, my plan is hopefully get an early Double Stroke and Iterative Analysis(And a Brago's Favor if I'm lucky), and proceed to draft all the Tyrant's Choices and Grudge Keepers. Fill the deck with Smallpox just to keep things in order. Seems dumb. Seems really dumb if you get multiple Double Strokes. The deck goes deep.
That's what I like about the format. So many different ways to go about the draft. Now that I have some experience with the format, my plan is hopefully get an early Double Stroke and Iterative Analysis(And a Brago's Favor if I'm lucky), and proceed to draft all the Tyrant's Choices and Grudge Keepers. Fill the deck with Smallpox just to keep things in order. Seems dumb. Seems really dumb if you get multiple Double Strokes. The deck goes deep.
If you get both those conspiracies, you should just draft brainstorms. Draw 5 put 2 back...
That's what I like about the format. So many different ways to go about the draft. Now that I have some experience with the format, my plan is hopefully get an early Double Stroke and Iterative Analysis(And a Brago's Favor if I'm lucky), and proceed to draft all the Tyrant's Choices and Grudge Keepers. Fill the deck with Smallpox just to keep things in order. Seems dumb. Seems really dumb if you get multiple Double Strokes. The deck goes deep.
If you get both those conspiracies, you should just draft brainstorms. Draw 5 put 2 back...
I thought about it. I had a lot of people say brainstorm wasn't great in draft, but after playing my first draft and getting a full 4 it was absolutely phenomenal. Even better with land cyclers, though not necessary for the card to be useful.
That said, there is something to be said about "Each opponent sacs 1-2 creatures and lose 4-8 life and you draw a card" for 2 mana that seems good. Particularly with Grudge Keeper. If you have two grudge keepers out, your opponents are forced to do whatever you want. And god forbid you get multiple Double Strokes. Can you imagine copying Tyrant's Choice twice each casting with any number of Grudge Keeper on the board? Seems just gross. One can envision knocking your opponents out on turn 4 with 2 grudge keepers and 2 Tyrant's Choices (You choose life loss for each time, they can't disagree or else they lose 4 life anyway; you get 6 copies for 24 life loss each opponent).
We had some pretty epic moments. My favorite was in a friend's game.
He casts Liliana's Specter. A second player reluctantly discards Phage the Untouchable because he's so far away from casting her.
Two turns later out comes another player's Magister of Worth. The vote was definitively in favor of Grace.
I was very kind with the first deck, as I was playing super casual and decided to not go any futher than a turn 4 Pellaka Wurm, despite having the follow up of 2 stupidly big elephants in hand along with Victimize to add further resiliance!
The Second Game was more all or nothing, so I was annoyed but not surprised by the loss of Brago to Swords after cheating him in with Deathrender!
Overall the set is Super Fun and I am looking forward to playing again. As a result, I will probably get a box to hold onto for future!
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Disclaimer: As per the norm, I am aware some people will disagree with my opinion and I acknowledge there is a possibility that my opinion is wrong. The above post is simply my musings on what I view to be the most likely scenario given the information that is available and I am aware of at the time of typing! Peace.
I'm definitely having a lot of fun with this format...I especially like the prevalence of niche strategies, which is something that's been pretty absent in Theros block. My first draft I was able to pull off the Screaming Seahawk deck...I was able to pick up 4, and with 3 conspiracies, they were 3/3 flying haste for 4 the fished out another copy from your deck. One thing I misplayed though...the +1/+1 conspiracy places a +1/+1 counter instead of simply granting +1/+1...I incorrectly used it as a combat trick.
I also like that the defender deck exists...unfortunately in my second draft I split the Vent Sentinels with someone else, so I didn't really pull it off.
All in all, a very fun format, especially if you're a Johnny-ish player: there are also sorts of nifty interactions waiting to be pulling off.
I have been really excited to try out conspiracy and I've noticed there just seems to be so much value in this set. Maybe it's just some lucky boxes, but even in the video wizards did a few weeks back it seemed two Dack's were pulled in the same box.
Here's my story with my first box:
I play VERY casually. Been to fnm only 3 times. I prefer commander but my wife and I love to draft. We have done a couple dozen drafts just the two of us. Usually we have enough packs for 4 players and draft 1 deck each and randomly pull cards for the other two non-existing players. This time we tried building two decks each with 4 non-existing players (as if it was a full 8-person draft). Then we reused all the cards from the 4 non-existing players as well as 12 more boosters to draft two more decks each while still randomly pulling cards as if we had 8 people again. The value of the cards we got, to me, seems high for just one box worth. 4 mythics and a slew of other great cards. Here's a quick list of the cards with about 5 dollars value or more Marchesa Mirari's Wake Muzzio Scourge of the Throne
2 exploration stifle misdirection
foil swords to plowshares council's judgment dack's duplicate Edric Grenzo
2 reflecting pool vedalken orrery
With a number of other good rares that will definitely help my commander decks it seems this box was worth the price. But again, it seems like everyone has been saying they've gotten great pulls for the boxes they've seen.
One last note for bragging rights, we didn't get any lore seeker but I had gotten a couple extra packs just in case we did. We ended up just drafting them anyways at the end. 1 pack each of Avacyn Restored, Innistrad, Modern Masters, and Journey into Nyx. The INN pack was disappointing (stensia bloodhall) but the other 3 each had a mythic which was just crazy. Got an Iroas, god of victory, Bruna, light of alabaster, and Kokusho, the evening star. There was also a foil grand arbiter augustin IV in the MM pack. Pretty insane.
if you want to see a little about my decks...
Deck 1: R/G splash U
I added blue just for Edric. With an Exploration in the deck and some card draw from parly abilities and edric, I can get lands out faster for big guns like a pelakka wurm, the 2 boldwyr intimidators, scourge of the throne, or the cyclops of eternal fury i pulled from the JOU pack. Using lots of burn spells for the removal.
Deck 2: W/B
two brago's favor both set for Reya Dawnbringer help get her out faster, lots of sacrifice stuff like altar of dementia, vampire hexmage, victimize, and a reign of the pit . along with a couple doomed traveler's to use for the sacrfice, a Thraben Sentry from the INN pack which can easily flip in this deck, and finally 2 tragic slips, a council's judgement, mortify, Magister of Worth and 2 swords to plowshares to deal with opponent's stuff.
Deck 3: R/B
3 Cindar walls and 2 typhoid rats are the focus of this deck. Once deathrender comes out, equip to either the walls or rats and if it dies, pull a creature from your hand - hopefully something like deathforge shaman...since you don't pay the casting cost you can put all your R into the kicker. Same with skitter of lizards. If no one is willing to attack into the wall, use it yourself (with a warmonger's chariot) or just kill it yourself. Also have the Kokusho from MM in this deck and an ignition team that could be brought out with the sword if need be and an ill-gotten gains to bring a few of those creatures back from the GY
Deck 4: W/U
One of my favorite builds in draft is W/U fliers. This deck is just that. 2 air servant , 2 wind dancer, a soulcatcher , favorable winds, 3 crookclaw transmuter , jetting glasskite, custodi squire, along with a couple swords to plowshares and the ability to filter from a pair of brainstorms and card draw from compulsive research plus a Grand Arbiter I pulled from MM pack...pretty solid all around a probably my favorite of the 4
@ Frosty - Just want to say that you can't kick a creature put into play off Deathrender. You don't cast the card ("put it onto the battlefield"), and you can only pay extra costs when you cast a spell. If Deathrender said "cast without paying its mana cost" then you could kick it.
Other than that, sounds like a good idea for drafting with a small group. I might try that at some point.
Had another fantastic play in the last draft I ran with some friends. We decided to play 5-pointed star, ended up being a very long, political and epic game. Late into the game (with all players still in).
My allies team up with one of my enemies to dropping me from 13 to 1. Manage to survive back to my turn. Topdeck magister of worth. Laugh hysterically, deciding I will cause utter chaos before being taken out. Everyone votes for grace. Dozens of creatures come back. Someone's newly resurrected selvala's enforcer triggers and we parley. I reveal and draw altar of dementia. I then realized that I have about 30 power on the board, while my two opponents each have about 12 cards left in their libraries. Once I recover my jaw from the floor, I nuke my own board and pass the turn for the win.
I fairly happy with the set overall. I like it better than Theros block currently, but that may be due to burn-out. My observations thus far:
G and W are solid colors with G having big beaters with some token generation. W has vigilance, big butts and flyers, allowing them to defend and assault without compromising defenders.
R,B and U seem to be a bit further behind. U and B don't seem to have the base creatures to hold up under the assault from G and limited removal. R has the same problems that it has always had in multiplayer, it runs out of gas with few ways to push through the final bit of damage.
Gx or Wx decks seem to do the best from what I have observed.
My on real head scratcher is dethrone. It's on red and blue, but mostly red. R in multiplayer, with the way they build it, is almost always the leader in life total, meaning you get 1 or 2 activations of dethrone and then it's over. Any subsequent dethrone cards a useless, until really late in the game, where they don't matter. I think R would have done better with an emphasis on first strike and dethrone going on W or B cards. W because the then to play from behind occasionally and B because they can get their life total down.
Conspiracy cards have been fun and make the game a bit different. No complaints here.
One thing I really want to try is the Monarch format in a conspiracy draft. For those of you who don't know this format:
In Brief: Players are secretly assigned a role at random. Victory for a player is determined by his or her role.
Rules Rundown: Each player is randomly, and secretly, assigned a role. This works best for six players, but alternative versions will work as well:
One player is the Monarch and makes his or her role known. (All other roles stay secret.)
One player is the Bodyguard. The Bodyguard and the Monarch win if they are the last two players in the game.
Three players are Assassins, who win if the Monarch is defeated.
One player is the Traitor, who wins when he or she defeats the Monarch and is the last player in the game.
While that's the nuts and bolts, there are a few more tweaks the players local to me use:
When the Monarch is identified, he or she may choose to switch decks before starting the game. This lets the Monarch use a deck better suited to resisting attacks and destruction.
The Monarch goes first. (It's good to be king!)
At the end of a game, whoever defeated the Monarch becomes the Monarch for the next game. The remaining roles are secretly assigned as normal.
Pros: Usurpers is a logical evolution of Assassins, amplifying the secrecy and reward for subtle blows. Creating quasi-teams that can win without necessarily coordinating fully, and that are formed randomly at the table, encourages socialization without collusion. Earning the right to become the next Monarch adds a subtle twist some players will enjoy.
Cons: Secret objectives aren't for everyone, and the inability to coordinate clearly with "teammates" can be frustrating. If the idea of Assassins isn't appealing, Usurpers will be even less so.
This if from an article called Battle Prowess. My group has tried it a few times and it was okay but only some people have some absurd rush or shutdown decks and they really get a big advantage in this format so we stopped. However, if we were to assign roles then do a draft this could be a hell of a lot of fun. (even more than a conspiracy draft already is) I recently got a booster box of conspiracy and had a great time with some friends and now I'm putting it back together and sleeving it (I might also buy a few more cards for my pool) so we can try this in the future. The Draft matters cards are already awesome but using them to try to figure out what role someone is and draft based on that seems even better.
sadly all my fun got ruined but my opponents silent arbiter and then a bassandra battle serif... so I couldn't echoing courage my wolves. I sadly never saw the +1/+1 counter conspiracy.. but I got the haste and costs 1 less ones.
Haven't had a chance to draft or crack any Conspiracy. My brother picked up some singles though. But my question is how the packs are arranged -- is the 15th card in each pack either a draft related artifact or a conspiracy?
Haven't had a chance to draft or crack any Conspiracy. My brother picked up some singles though. But my question is how the packs are arranged -- is the 15th card in each pack either a draft related artifact or a conspiracy?
That's right. A card with the "stamp" watermark goes in the 15th slot.
Shared win: An opposing Rouse the Souls cantrip deck with Intangible Virtue casts Rouse (1 of 7+ copies in the deck).
- Parley reveals my Volcanic Fallout. I have a second one in hand. He cannot kill me despite my low life else I wipe his army. He cannot cast Virtue or Favorable Winds else I wipe.
- He casts Altar of Dementia. I have 4+ Shatter Devils in my deck. I allow Altar to resolve and he knows as soon as it mills me a card, I will Fallout.
- Game progresses he is reduced to 1 damage. Another player is around 20 life with reach defense. By accord, the Rouser mills that player for 14 and we share the win.
Some players may not like the hostage shared victory, but we had fun with it.
Yeah, I opened up a prize pack when I got home and pulled one and as I was putting it into one of my EDH techs I noticed the can't be regenerated clause. Whoops. I don't know how all four of us in the pod missed that haha.
I'll probably be going for a third draft this weekend, and I've made it my mission to draft something new. Maybe Izzet/Grixis Dethrone? Even if I don't pull a Marchesa it should be a pretty good deck base.
Art is life itself.
That's what I like about the format. So many different ways to go about the draft. Now that I have some experience with the format, my plan is hopefully get an early Double Stroke and Iterative Analysis(And a Brago's Favor if I'm lucky), and proceed to draft all the Tyrant's Choices and Grudge Keepers. Fill the deck with Smallpox just to keep things in order. Seems dumb. Seems really dumb if you get multiple Double Strokes. The deck goes deep.
If you get both those conspiracies, you should just draft brainstorms. Draw 5 put 2 back...
I thought about it. I had a lot of people say brainstorm wasn't great in draft, but after playing my first draft and getting a full 4 it was absolutely phenomenal. Even better with land cyclers, though not necessary for the card to be useful.
That said, there is something to be said about "Each opponent sacs 1-2 creatures and lose 4-8 life and you draw a card" for 2 mana that seems good. Particularly with Grudge Keeper. If you have two grudge keepers out, your opponents are forced to do whatever you want. And god forbid you get multiple Double Strokes. Can you imagine copying Tyrant's Choice twice each casting with any number of Grudge Keeper on the board? Seems just gross. One can envision knocking your opponents out on turn 4 with 2 grudge keepers and 2 Tyrant's Choices (You choose life loss for each time, they can't disagree or else they lose 4 life anyway; you get 6 copies for 24 life loss each opponent).
He casts Liliana's Specter. A second player reluctantly discards Phage the Untouchable because he's so far away from casting her.
Two turns later out comes another player's Magister of Worth. The vote was definitively in favor of Grace.
Whoops! What an awful way to lose!
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Currently playing Knight of the Reliquary - Retreat to Coralhelm Combo
First Deck: 3 x Sakura-Tribe Elder, 1 x Pellaka Wurm, 2 x Terasodon, combo-ed with Secret Summoning.
Seoond Deck: 1 x Brago, King Eternal and 3 x Liliana's Specter combo-ed with Unexpected Potential and Secret Summoning.
I was very kind with the first deck, as I was playing super casual and decided to not go any futher than a turn 4 Pellaka Wurm, despite having the follow up of 2 stupidly big elephants in hand along with Victimize to add further resiliance!
The Second Game was more all or nothing, so I was annoyed but not surprised by the loss of Brago to Swords after cheating him in with Deathrender!
Overall the set is Super Fun and I am looking forward to playing again. As a result, I will probably get a box to hold onto for future!
I also like that the defender deck exists...unfortunately in my second draft I split the Vent Sentinels with someone else, so I didn't really pull it off.
All in all, a very fun format, especially if you're a Johnny-ish player: there are also sorts of nifty interactions waiting to be pulling off.
Here's my story with my first box:
I play VERY casually. Been to fnm only 3 times. I prefer commander but my wife and I love to draft. We have done a couple dozen drafts just the two of us. Usually we have enough packs for 4 players and draft 1 deck each and randomly pull cards for the other two non-existing players. This time we tried building two decks each with 4 non-existing players (as if it was a full 8-person draft). Then we reused all the cards from the 4 non-existing players as well as 12 more boosters to draft two more decks each while still randomly pulling cards as if we had 8 people again. The value of the cards we got, to me, seems high for just one box worth. 4 mythics and a slew of other great cards. Here's a quick list of the cards with about 5 dollars value or more
Marchesa
Mirari's Wake
Muzzio
Scourge of the Throne
2 exploration
stifle
misdirection
foil swords to plowshares
council's judgment
dack's duplicate
Edric
Grenzo
2 reflecting pool
vedalken orrery
With a number of other good rares that will definitely help my commander decks it seems this box was worth the price. But again, it seems like everyone has been saying they've gotten great pulls for the boxes they've seen.
One last note for bragging rights, we didn't get any lore seeker but I had gotten a couple extra packs just in case we did. We ended up just drafting them anyways at the end. 1 pack each of Avacyn Restored, Innistrad, Modern Masters, and Journey into Nyx. The INN pack was disappointing (stensia bloodhall) but the other 3 each had a mythic which was just crazy. Got an Iroas, god of victory, Bruna, light of alabaster, and Kokusho, the evening star. There was also a foil grand arbiter augustin IV in the MM pack. Pretty insane.
if you want to see a little about my decks...
Deck 1: R/G splash U
I added blue just for Edric. With an Exploration in the deck and some card draw from parly abilities and edric, I can get lands out faster for big guns like a pelakka wurm, the 2 boldwyr intimidators, scourge of the throne, or the cyclops of eternal fury i pulled from the JOU pack. Using lots of burn spells for the removal.
Deck 2: W/B
two brago's favor both set for Reya Dawnbringer help get her out faster, lots of sacrifice stuff like altar of dementia, vampire hexmage, victimize, and a reign of the pit . along with a couple doomed traveler's to use for the sacrfice, a Thraben Sentry from the INN pack which can easily flip in this deck, and finally 2 tragic slips, a council's judgement, mortify, Magister of Worth and 2 swords to plowshares to deal with opponent's stuff.
Deck 3: R/B
3 Cindar walls and 2 typhoid rats are the focus of this deck. Once deathrender comes out, equip to either the walls or rats and if it dies, pull a creature from your hand - hopefully something like deathforge shaman...since you don't pay the casting cost you can put all your R into the kicker. Same with skitter of lizards. If no one is willing to attack into the wall, use it yourself (with a warmonger's chariot) or just kill it yourself. Also have the Kokusho from MM in this deck and an ignition team that could be brought out with the sword if need be and an ill-gotten gains to bring a few of those creatures back from the GY
Deck 4: W/U
One of my favorite builds in draft is W/U fliers. This deck is just that. 2 air servant , 2 wind dancer, a soulcatcher , favorable winds, 3 crookclaw transmuter , jetting glasskite, custodi squire, along with a couple swords to plowshares and the ability to filter from a pair of brainstorms and card draw from compulsive research plus a Grand Arbiter I pulled from MM pack...pretty solid all around a probably my favorite of the 4
Other than that, sounds like a good idea for drafting with a small group. I might try that at some point.
My allies team up with one of my enemies to dropping me from 13 to 1. Manage to survive back to my turn. Topdeck magister of worth. Laugh hysterically, deciding I will cause utter chaos before being taken out. Everyone votes for grace. Dozens of creatures come back. Someone's newly resurrected selvala's enforcer triggers and we parley. I reveal and draw altar of dementia. I then realized that I have about 30 power on the board, while my two opponents each have about 12 cards left in their libraries. Once I recover my jaw from the floor, I nuke my own board and pass the turn for the win.
G and W are solid colors with G having big beaters with some token generation. W has vigilance, big butts and flyers, allowing them to defend and assault without compromising defenders.
R,B and U seem to be a bit further behind. U and B don't seem to have the base creatures to hold up under the assault from G and limited removal. R has the same problems that it has always had in multiplayer, it runs out of gas with few ways to push through the final bit of damage.
Gx or Wx decks seem to do the best from what I have observed.
My on real head scratcher is dethrone. It's on red and blue, but mostly red. R in multiplayer, with the way they build it, is almost always the leader in life total, meaning you get 1 or 2 activations of dethrone and then it's over. Any subsequent dethrone cards a useless, until really late in the game, where they don't matter. I think R would have done better with an emphasis on first strike and dethrone going on W or B cards. W because the then to play from behind occasionally and B because they can get their life total down.
Conspiracy cards have been fun and make the game a bit different. No complaints here.
Rules Rundown: Each player is randomly, and secretly, assigned a role. This works best for six players, but alternative versions will work as well:
One player is the Monarch and makes his or her role known. (All other roles stay secret.)
One player is the Bodyguard. The Bodyguard and the Monarch win if they are the last two players in the game.
Three players are Assassins, who win if the Monarch is defeated.
One player is the Traitor, who wins when he or she defeats the Monarch and is the last player in the game.
While that's the nuts and bolts, there are a few more tweaks the players local to me use:
When the Monarch is identified, he or she may choose to switch decks before starting the game. This lets the Monarch use a deck better suited to resisting attacks and destruction.
The Monarch goes first. (It's good to be king!)
At the end of a game, whoever defeated the Monarch becomes the Monarch for the next game. The remaining roles are secretly assigned as normal.
Pros: Usurpers is a logical evolution of Assassins, amplifying the secrecy and reward for subtle blows. Creating quasi-teams that can win without necessarily coordinating fully, and that are formed randomly at the table, encourages socialization without collusion. Earning the right to become the next Monarch adds a subtle twist some players will enjoy.
Cons: Secret objectives aren't for everyone, and the inability to coordinate clearly with "teammates" can be frustrating. If the idea of Assassins isn't appealing, Usurpers will be even less so.
This if from an article called Battle Prowess. My group has tried it a few times and it was okay but only some people have some absurd rush or shutdown decks and they really get a big advantage in this format so we stopped. However, if we were to assign roles then do a draft this could be a hell of a lot of fun. (even more than a conspiracy draft already is) I recently got a booster box of conspiracy and had a great time with some friends and now I'm putting it back together and sleeving it (I might also buy a few more cards for my pool) so we can try this in the future. The Draft matters cards are already awesome but using them to try to figure out what role someone is and draft based on that seems even better.
sadly all my fun got ruined but my opponents silent arbiter and then a bassandra battle serif... so I couldn't echoing courage my wolves. I sadly never saw the +1/+1 counter conspiracy.. but I got the haste and costs 1 less ones.
Pioneer:UR Pheonix
Modern:U Mono U Tron
EDH
GB Glissa, the traitor: Army of Cans
UW Dragonlord Ojutai: Dragonlord NOjutai
UWGDerevi, Empyrial Tactician "you cannot fight the storm"
R Zirilan of the claw. The solution to every problem is dragons
UB Etrata, the Silencer Cloning assassination
Peasant cube: Cards I own
That's right. A card with the "stamp" watermark goes in the 15th slot.
My Custom Cube - a super-powered Core Set