Discussion of a new set tends to focus on individual cards, so I though it would be good to have a thread for broader discussion of colours, archetypes and predictions for how Draft and Sealed will play.
Here are my impressions so far (based only on a quick read of the full spoiler and some guesswork):
* First and foremost, this really looks like "Uncommons: the Gathering" to me. A lot of the Commons are really weak, particularly at lower mana costs.
* There's a lot of flying in the set and this seems to be a theme of sorts. Flying creatures seem (ironically) less valuable than usual as a result.
* There seems likely to be a super fast R/X deck. Red actually has decent tools for this at Common! It looks quite scary. I can't quite work out whether this deck always cares about Humans, or only sometimes.
* Green has a not-very-subtle Soulbond theme that looks super swingy. Its good draws are fairly absurd, but it seems easy to get wrecked.
* Blue mostly seems to be the slooow colour. Scrapskin Drake is probably not as good as it would be in most sets. Mist Raven looks amazing with all the flicker in the set.
Anyone else got any thoughts so far? Any idea how Black will play (as the "non-Human" colour it might be quite interesting...)?
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Anyone else got any thoughts so far? Any idea how Black will play (as the "non-Human" colour it might be quite interesting...)?
I think black will be rather similar to red was in INNx3. It's got some decent removal, some okay removal and some good four drops but all of these are light on colour requirements. It seems like a weak main colour but a strong splash colour.
* There seems likely to be a super fast R/X deck. Red actually has decent tools for this at Common! It looks quite scary. I can't quite work out whether this deck always cares about Humans, or only sometimes.
You're 100% right about this. Red has the highest card quality in Common imo, with a couple of OK removal spells, and some good synergy between the common Humans.. looking at potential combos of Thatcher Rebellion, Kruin Striker, Hanweir Lancer, Kessig Malcontents and Riot Ringleader. Lots of fun.
W/x angels could be an archetype too, if you can draft enough early-game drops so you don't get blown away by red before you can get to your 4cmc+ angels. the Angelic Wall thing looks good.
some sort of cool Soulbonding archetype could come out of U/G, although I reckon drafting a decent curve would be difficult with so few options in most of the spots.
My uninformed two cents summary; Red aside, I think this will be a slow format.
You're 100% right about this. Red has the highest card quality in Common imo, with a couple of OK removal spells, and some good synergy between the common Humans.. looking at potential combos of Thatcher Rebellion, Kruin Striker, Hanweir Lancer, Kessig Malcontents and Riot Ringleader. Lots of fun.
Goldnight Commander seems insane in that deck (works well with the aggressive plan in general and makes Thatcher Revolt come with a free Overrun, minus the trample). Getting one early seems like a good incentive to draft RW aggro.
There's a lot of hate for flyers in the set.
Looking at the (likely) playable common creatures across the different colors, green seems to have a significant edge over the others on P/T vs. mana cost, more so than usual... especially with its Soulbond theme. But that's just my impression, I haven't actually compared mathematically to other sets.
Only black gets anything that reliably offs bombs (or hell, even craw worms) at common, and most colours only have 1 or two quality uncommon pieces.
I think this makes green's bigger creatures even more valuable, green has the very relevant ability of being able to go bigger at common rather easily.
There's almost no mana fixing: just two green commons and an uncommon artifact. So splashing will be tougher than usual if you're not in green.
Yes, but they're all common. And the two green ones are very good - cards I would always play whenever I'm green. And the artifact is acceleration also, so it will see play 100% of the time as well, despite the stupid tacked on ability making it seem worse than it is. These aren't cards like we had in ISD. Traveler's Amulet, et al. ISD had fixing that made for great splashes but mediocre otherwise. This fixing is always worth playing, and as such I might very well be happy to 1st or 2nd pick them.
The set honestly looks like it's going to play very badly, but I can't see them printing a lot of the cards they decided to print unless it all goes together way better than it seems to. It's going to be either really easy or really hard to draft a competitive deck; I wish I knew which it was.
Wit's End is the PERFECT answer to your opponent's Monomania however.
Just hold on to your Wit's End when they Monomania, so you can Wit's End them on your next turn!!!
I think this is fairly reminiscent of the "Jace Battles" we have seen in past standards.. My guess is we will soon witness the great Monomania-Wit's End battles.
I don't think there are more fliers, number-wise. I do think they are stronger than usual, and red/green have stronger anti-flier cards as a response.
White doesn’t seem to have a strong two- or three-drop creature that beats all others in combat. Instead, it seems to have traded for big creatures (Seraph of Dawn, Spectral Gateguards, Voice of the Provinces). It will be interesting to see if Cathedral Sanctifier is a legitimate anti-aggro card.
I’m not entirely sure where to go with black. There’s a sacrifice outlet in Bloodflow Connoisseur, but the creatures with die triggers are four-drops. The choices for Driver of the Dead in black are Butcher Ghoul and Crypt Creeper. One strategy with black may be a suicide rush, using cards that no other archetype would want. Soulcage Fiend with multiple copies of Scroll of Griselbrand. Bloodflow Connoisseur with Predator’s Gambit, sacrificing all other creatures on the attack, but playing guys after combat for defense. Essence Harvest to for the last remaining points. Removal is weaker in this set, but this strategy still feels fragile. I suspect Driver of the Dead may be paired with red or green for some reach in aggro.
I don’t have anything to add for red. Smash with lots of guys with lots of bonuses go go smash!
Half of green’s common creatures have soulbond. Is that good enough for Flowering Lumberknot? I suspect not, with Nettle Swine and Wildwood Geist as alternatives. Green does seem to pair well with most of the other colors:
Green-white: White has big creatures. While green does not have ramp this set, Borderland Ranger helps ensure reaching the higher mana costs.
I don't really see how GW can work. Both white and green have early aggro drops and a bunch of late drops, but really nothing to stabilize with in the mid-game - they're going to either lose the advantage early and never have the means to catch up, or else try to grab an early advantage and end up getting stonewalled. They are also the two shallowest colors, in terms of drafting a curve. Drafting GW seems like an exercise in futility to me.
WU does have the defensive tools to make a decent skies deck, but it's going to be a lot slower than anyone is used to, and a lot more hatable out of the sideboard. You also just don't have the tools to gum up the ground that that deck has historically wanted. That's not to say this won't be a good deck, because I think it probably will, but it demonstrates the kind of power level shift we're going to need to get used to. Blue/White needs to run stuff to protect its fliers, and try to win the race, rather than making much attempt to control the ground.
BR is definitely going to be the aggro archetype to beat. It has more common aggressive creatures than any other color combination, and access to removal that slower decks are simply not going to be able to use, like Ghoulflesh and Guise of Fire.
R/G is probably the next best color combination for aggro, just because these colors have most of the good soulbond stuff at low CMC. The trouble is going to be that these colors are going to have a real hard time stopping the opponent from stabilizing. There's some stuff like Fervent Cathar and Joint Assault which will obviously work, but I'm not convinced that's it's enough to really make it a powerful archetype.
GU is very interesting. GU is usually my favorite color combination to make work, and the prospect of mixing soulbond and flicker stuff is right along the lines of something I think would be awesome. Blue also has the midgame stuff to help bridge the gap from green's early game to green's late game, and the prospect of going Wingcrafter, Timberland Guide, Trusted Forcemage is pretty exciting. This may end up being my go-to archetype in draft.
Wit's End is the PERFECT answer to your opponent's Monomania however.
Just hold on to your Wit's End when they Monomania, so you can Wit's End them on your next turn!!!
I think this is fairly reminiscent of the "Jace Battles" we have seen in past standards.. My guess is we will soon witness the great Monomania-Wit's End battles.
I feel like Favored Winds is the new Venerated Teacher that pushes the flying over the top.
Mistraven looks INSAAAAAAANE.
The uncommon red Soulbound Haste creature seems so awesome for just playing a good 3/4 drop and pairing it and getting IN there. Probably good in constructed? Not sure.
Would anyone be interested in finding a site and testing some sealed pools before this Saturday? I won my last Pre-release and I want to run it back. =)
I see lumberknot as very weak. It's sort of setting you up for being 2 for 1ed. I think there will be many matches ending with: Kill your soulbond-dude, Swing through your not so impressive lumberknot defense for the win.
Vessel of endless rest is the nuts. Without an impressive rare in the pack I will be happy to 1pick it any time. It is the only form of mana acceleration (in a bombheavy format) and it makes it so much easier to splash some very valuable cards. Lets not forget it keeps you open colorwise in a draft, and of course if you can hit a relevant card in the graveyard, it's a fine bonus.
Human frailty and death wind are solid. If i have a vessel or play a green base, I will try to make room for them both. Both hits the vast majority of soulbond action, making for some silly outcomes of the combat. This is also why I would play 1 or 2 of the green instants that protects your dudes.
As someone said before me I also see the format as very swingy, therefore I will pick instant removal very highly.
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I am petitioning for the removal of mythic rarity and boycotting overpriced singles. Sig this to join the cause for a more affordable Magic the Gathering.
1) Well, it's very possible to end games when your opponent makes terrible plays. Leaving a Flowering Lumberknot as your blocker is just asking to get blown out; it's only good when you're attacking. That said, it makes a pretty potent attacker in the right deck (particularly since it breaks up the times when your opponent wants to break the pair: Lumberknot makes your opponent want to kill it pre-attack step, most soulbond guys will be vulnerable to pairbreaking after attacks are declared, so you reduce your vulnerability to blowouts with this guy); we'll have to see how reliably that deck can be put together.
2) Human Frailty is a sideboard card. Victim of Night in ISD is already pretty marginal in the maindeck for lack of targets, and Frailty is even more restricted. Frailty is definitely a very good sideboard card, though, and I'll be happy to pick them up before they table (although I'm sure other people will be 1st picking them early on and I won't have much chance to play with it.)
Wit's End is the PERFECT answer to your opponent's Monomania however.
Just hold on to your Wit's End when they Monomania, so you can Wit's End them on your next turn!!!
I think this is fairly reminiscent of the "Jace Battles" we have seen in past standards.. My guess is we will soon witness the great Monomania-Wit's End battles.
Banishing Stroke (U) - As a miracle, this won't often be cast as a blowout in combat until the very late game. Mostly behaves like expensive sorcery speed removal.
Divine Deflection (R) - It's amazing, and a huge blowout, but rare. People will also telegraph having this pretty badly a lot of the time, so watch for that. Gonna be unbelievably good at the prerelease and get progressively less exciting as the format evolves.
Restoration Angel (R) - Frankly incredible. You couldn't ask for a bigger chance for a blowout than this. But it's a rare.
Righteous Blow (C) - Easily maindeckable, since it costs 1, but low blowout potential.
Zealous Strike (C) - Excellent blowout potential. Blows apart multi-blocks, breaks bond pairs before they do damage (in all but the obvious two cases :p) and is a big enough effect to save almost any creature in 1-on-1 combat. Also saves stuff from most removal.
Fleeting Distraction (C) - Very low blowout potential, but it replaces itself and is super cheap, so probably maindeckable anyway.
Peel from Reality (C) - Good blowout potential, since it reliably breaks bond pairs and saves your guys at the same time. The real power of this is in creating tempo with ETB stuff like Mistraven, though.
Vanishment (U) - It's Boomerang for two and a half times the price. It's disappointing as a miracle, since your upkeep is almost never when you want to bounce stuff, but at 5 mana it's basically unplayable.
Death Wind (C) - Low-ish blowout potential. It's kinda expensive and hard not to telegraph, and only really kills something for quite a bit of mana. It's fine as removal, but won't surprise anyone.
Human Frailty (C) - Decent blowout potential, but this is another card that will surely overperform at the prerelease but not really be that good as people learn to predict it.
Necrobite (C) - Gaze of the Gorgon for 1 less mana and no second color shenanigans. Decent blowout potential, but, like its predecessor, easy to predict and lots of outs to it.
Aggravate (U) - Low blowout potential midcombat, but maybe makes up for it by being a Panic Attack? Should end lots of games.
Banners Raised (C) - Very low blowout potential.
Rush of Blood (U) - Low-ish blowout potential.
Thunderbolt (C) - Very low blowout potential.
Thunderous Wrath (R) - See Banishing Stroke, except moreso.
Uncanny Speed (C) - Low blowout potential.
Eaten by Spiders (U) - Low blowout potential, but out of the sideboard, has a lot of promise.
Joint Assault (C) - Very high blowout potential. Excellent card.
Snare the Skies (C) - Low-ish blowout potential. People will be expecting flying hate from people and this is about the weakest of them.
Sheltering Word (C) - Extremely low blowout potential.
Terrifying Presence (C) - High-ish blowout potential, but so awful in so many situations that I would probably not maindeck it. Depends on how cluttered board states tend to get in the format. Kinda like a weak Moonmist that works outside of werewolves.
Wolfir Avenger (U) - Very high blowout potential. Amazing card.
Wit's End is the PERFECT answer to your opponent's Monomania however.
Just hold on to your Wit's End when they Monomania, so you can Wit's End them on your next turn!!!
I think this is fairly reminiscent of the "Jace Battles" we have seen in past standards.. My guess is we will soon witness the great Monomania-Wit's End battles.
the more I look at the spoiler the more I'm thinking that blue is red's best partner - Mist Raven, Wingcrafter and Crippling Chill all work fantastically with red's plan.
Yup, I've been thinking about that, too.
Scrapskin Drake is also a good fit since this is a deck where being unable to block shouldn't be a big deal.
I'm slightly concerned at the potential for ending up with too few creatures though - seems like there isn't much redundancy in terms of the cards you need to see to make it work.
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Has anyone else noticed how packed the three drop slot is? Angel's Tomb, Wolfir Avenger, Borderland Ranger, Tandem Lookout, Vessel of Endless Rest, Scrapskin Drake, Emancipation Angel, Fettergeist, Fervent Cathar, Bloodflow Connoisseur, Soulcage Fiend, Riot Ringleader, Lightning Prowess, Triumph of Ferocity, Demonic Taskmaster, Unhallowed Pact, Angelic Armaments, Crippling Chill, Thatcher Revolt, Latch Seeker, etc.
I tried to limit the list to playable/moderately playable commons and uncommons that would definitely vie for space in a deck (no Farbog Explorer), but there are some rare offenders too! (Silverblade Paladin, Dark Imposter, Captain of the Mists, Wild Defiance, Somberwald Sage, Druid's Repository, Champion of Lambholt). Green may be the worst offender, but blue is hogging up some 3cmc too. Perhaps I'm just imagining things though. Keep in mind however that it seems there are many more filler cards that take up the slot too (previously mentioned Farbog Explorer, Trusted Forcemage, Necrobite, etc, etc) Thoughts?
# of 3-drop non-rare creatures per color: White has 3 (2 uncommon), blue has 5 (3 uncommon), black has 4 (1 uncommon), Red has 4 (1 uncommon), green has 3 (1 uncommon). R/B has the most ability to draft a "normal" curve, white the least.
Even tacking Angel's Tomb on there as a creature, I'm not sure I'd call that packed. White and blue particularly are 3-drop shy. You're going to have a very hard time filling in your curve if you're in Bant colors.
Wit's End is the PERFECT answer to your opponent's Monomania however.
Just hold on to your Wit's End when they Monomania, so you can Wit's End them on your next turn!!!
I think this is fairly reminiscent of the "Jace Battles" we have seen in past standards.. My guess is we will soon witness the great Monomania-Wit's End battles.
Even tacking Angel's Tomb on there as a creature, I'm not sure I'd call that packed.
Indeed not - it's fewer than Innistrad!
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I love that blue has so many untap effects that work well with red, like you guys mentioned above. When I saw all the soulbond guys I thought to myself Wingcrafter + Lightning Mauler seems like a pretty fast flying clock.
Probably not. I suspect that Black/Green will generally be a terrible color combination; black has a major loner/sacrifice your stuff theme, and green has a major soulbond/lots of creatures helping each other theme. Feels very anti-synergistic.
I basically just think Triumph of Ferocity is good, no need to get cute with it. Looking at the set's common and uncommon creatures, having the biggest creature should be even easier than normal for green decks in this format. Phyrexian Arena is nuts, and a conditional Arena is still excellent when the condition is easy to achieve. Seems good.
As others have said red looks awesome. I especially like the look of scalding devil (so many X/1s to prey upon early + late necrobites to death's caress in the later turns if black. Think the -1 toughness auras will be playable due to this too).
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Just so you don't get yourself blown out at the pre-release, Scalding Devil can only target players. Which makes it a lot worse.
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If your question is "What would a judge do is this situation?", only one person's answer is relevant, and that is the Head Judge at your event. I can quote the rules, but I don't know your HJ.
I'm surprised people are saying that Red is the best color. I think the best color is easily Blue, followed by White. UW Fliers will be the best archetype.
Blue's common creatures are excellent:
Mist Raven, Gryff Vanguard and Elgaud Shieldmate are all already very good in a vacuum.
If you're able to combine them with blink effects, like Cloudshift, Ghostly Flicker and Nephalia Smuggler, they become better. Creatures with ETB effects also decent with Peel from Reality and Emancipation Angel.
Tandem Lookout obviously works well with evasive creatures and bounce.
I can't believe anyone is excited about this card. It is absolutely unplayable. I wouldn't even play her in LIMITED. Easily the worst walker printed since the green elf one. Absolutely terrible.
Incidentally, I wasn't suggesting Red would be the best archetype, it's just the deck that I found most obvious from the spoiler.
The trouble with W/U is that the curve looks horrible if you just throw in all the best cards. Clearly the power is there, it's a question of how to survive long enough to exploit it. As erebus91 pointed out earlier, cards like Angelic Wall might turn out to be quite critical to making it work.
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Here are my impressions so far (based only on a quick read of the full spoiler and some guesswork):
* First and foremost, this really looks like "Uncommons: the Gathering" to me. A lot of the Commons are really weak, particularly at lower mana costs.
* There's a lot of flying in the set and this seems to be a theme of sorts. Flying creatures seem (ironically) less valuable than usual as a result.
* There seems likely to be a super fast R/X deck. Red actually has decent tools for this at Common! It looks quite scary. I can't quite work out whether this deck always cares about Humans, or only sometimes.
* Green has a not-very-subtle Soulbond theme that looks super swingy. Its good draws are fairly absurd, but it seems easy to get wrecked.
* Blue mostly seems to be the slooow colour. Scrapskin Drake is probably not as good as it would be in most sets. Mist Raven looks amazing with all the flicker in the set.
Anyone else got any thoughts so far? Any idea how Black will play (as the "non-Human" colour it might be quite interesting...)?
(I'm on on this site much anymore. If you want to get in touch it's probably best to email me: dom@heffalumps.org)
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I think black will be rather similar to red was in INNx3. It's got some decent removal, some okay removal and some good four drops but all of these are light on colour requirements. It seems like a weak main colour but a strong splash colour.
Draft it on Cubetutor!
Practice for Khans of Tarkir Limited:
Draft: (#1) (#2) (#3) (#4) (#5)
You're 100% right about this. Red has the highest card quality in Common imo, with a couple of OK removal spells, and some good synergy between the common Humans.. looking at potential combos of Thatcher Rebellion, Kruin Striker, Hanweir Lancer, Kessig Malcontents and Riot Ringleader. Lots of fun.
W/x angels could be an archetype too, if you can draft enough early-game drops so you don't get blown away by red before you can get to your 4cmc+ angels. the Angelic Wall thing looks good.
some sort of cool Soulbonding archetype could come out of U/G, although I reckon drafting a decent curve would be difficult with so few options in most of the spots.
My uninformed two cents summary; Red aside, I think this will be a slow format.
Modern:
:symu::symw::symr: UWr Geist :symr::symw::symu:
EDH:
:symb::symb::symr::symr: Rakdos, Lord of Riots :symr::symr::symb::symb:
Goldnight Commander seems insane in that deck (works well with the aggressive plan in general and makes Thatcher Revolt come with a free Overrun, minus the trample). Getting one early seems like a good incentive to draft RW aggro.
There's a lot of hate for flyers in the set.
Looking at the (likely) playable common creatures across the different colors, green seems to have a significant edge over the others on P/T vs. mana cost, more so than usual... especially with its Soulbond theme. But that's just my impression, I haven't actually compared mathematically to other sets.
I think this makes green's bigger creatures even more valuable, green has the very relevant ability of being able to go bigger at common rather easily.
Draft it on Cubetutor!
Yes, but they're all common. And the two green ones are very good - cards I would always play whenever I'm green. And the artifact is acceleration also, so it will see play 100% of the time as well, despite the stupid tacked on ability making it seem worse than it is. These aren't cards like we had in ISD. Traveler's Amulet, et al. ISD had fixing that made for great splashes but mediocre otherwise. This fixing is always worth playing, and as such I might very well be happy to 1st or 2nd pick them.
The set honestly looks like it's going to play very badly, but I can't see them printing a lot of the cards they decided to print unless it all goes together way better than it seems to. It's going to be either really easy or really hard to draft a competitive deck; I wish I knew which it was.
White doesn’t seem to have a strong two- or three-drop creature that beats all others in combat. Instead, it seems to have traded for big creatures (Seraph of Dawn, Spectral Gateguards, Voice of the Provinces). It will be interesting to see if Cathedral Sanctifier is a legitimate anti-aggro card.
For all the buzz of white got with Cloudshift, blue is the true blink-master. At common, blue has Peel from Reality, Ghostly Flicker, Mist Raven, and Havengul Skaab. I think this blinking goes best with green, which would allow for resetting of soulbond pairs.
I’m not entirely sure where to go with black. There’s a sacrifice outlet in Bloodflow Connoisseur, but the creatures with die triggers are four-drops. The choices for Driver of the Dead in black are Butcher Ghoul and Crypt Creeper. One strategy with black may be a suicide rush, using cards that no other archetype would want. Soulcage Fiend with multiple copies of Scroll of Griselbrand. Bloodflow Connoisseur with Predator’s Gambit, sacrificing all other creatures on the attack, but playing guys after combat for defense. Essence Harvest to for the last remaining points. Removal is weaker in this set, but this strategy still feels fragile. I suspect Driver of the Dead may be paired with red or green for some reach in aggro.
I don’t have anything to add for red. Smash with lots of guys with lots of bonuses go go smash!
Half of green’s common creatures have soulbond. Is that good enough for Flowering Lumberknot? I suspect not, with Nettle Swine and Wildwood Geist as alternatives. Green does seem to pair well with most of the other colors:
Green-white: White has big creatures. While green does not have ramp this set, Borderland Ranger helps ensure reaching the higher mana costs.
Green-blue: Flicker tricks reset soulbond pairs.
Red-green: Wandering Wolf and Trusted Forcemage should be welcome additions to the red aggro machine.
My guesses for archetypes:
WU Skies
BR Suicide Aggro
RG Aggro
GW Big Quality Guys
GU Soulbond with Flicker
WU does have the defensive tools to make a decent skies deck, but it's going to be a lot slower than anyone is used to, and a lot more hatable out of the sideboard. You also just don't have the tools to gum up the ground that that deck has historically wanted. That's not to say this won't be a good deck, because I think it probably will, but it demonstrates the kind of power level shift we're going to need to get used to. Blue/White needs to run stuff to protect its fliers, and try to win the race, rather than making much attempt to control the ground.
BR is definitely going to be the aggro archetype to beat. It has more common aggressive creatures than any other color combination, and access to removal that slower decks are simply not going to be able to use, like Ghoulflesh and Guise of Fire.
R/G is probably the next best color combination for aggro, just because these colors have most of the good soulbond stuff at low CMC. The trouble is going to be that these colors are going to have a real hard time stopping the opponent from stabilizing. There's some stuff like Fervent Cathar and Joint Assault which will obviously work, but I'm not convinced that's it's enough to really make it a powerful archetype.
GU is very interesting. GU is usually my favorite color combination to make work, and the prospect of mixing soulbond and flicker stuff is right along the lines of something I think would be awesome. Blue also has the midgame stuff to help bridge the gap from green's early game to green's late game, and the prospect of going Wingcrafter, Timberland Guide, Trusted Forcemage is pretty exciting. This may end up being my go-to archetype in draft.
Mistraven looks INSAAAAAAANE.
The uncommon red Soulbound Haste creature seems so awesome for just playing a good 3/4 drop and pairing it and getting IN there. Probably good in constructed? Not sure.
Would anyone be interested in finding a site and testing some sealed pools before this Saturday? I won my last Pre-release and I want to run it back. =)
JAMMIT DIM! I'm a DOCTOR not a DECKBUILDER!
I see lumberknot as very weak. It's sort of setting you up for being 2 for 1ed. I think there will be many matches ending with: Kill your soulbond-dude, Swing through your not so impressive lumberknot defense for the win.
Vessel of endless rest is the nuts. Without an impressive rare in the pack I will be happy to 1pick it any time. It is the only form of mana acceleration (in a bombheavy format) and it makes it so much easier to splash some very valuable cards. Lets not forget it keeps you open colorwise in a draft, and of course if you can hit a relevant card in the graveyard, it's a fine bonus.
Human frailty and death wind are solid. If i have a vessel or play a green base, I will try to make room for them both. Both hits the vast majority of soulbond action, making for some silly outcomes of the combat. This is also why I would play 1 or 2 of the green instants that protects your dudes.
As someone said before me I also see the format as very swingy, therefore I will pick instant removal very highly.
2) Human Frailty is a sideboard card. Victim of Night in ISD is already pretty marginal in the maindeck for lack of targets, and Frailty is even more restricted. Frailty is definitely a very good sideboard card, though, and I'll be happy to pick them up before they table (although I'm sure other people will be 1st picking them early on and I won't have much chance to play with it.)
Banishing Stroke (U) - As a miracle, this won't often be cast as a blowout in combat until the very late game. Mostly behaves like expensive sorcery speed removal.
Divine Deflection (R) - It's amazing, and a huge blowout, but rare. People will also telegraph having this pretty badly a lot of the time, so watch for that. Gonna be unbelievably good at the prerelease and get progressively less exciting as the format evolves.
Restoration Angel (R) - Frankly incredible. You couldn't ask for a bigger chance for a blowout than this. But it's a rare.
Righteous Blow (C) - Easily maindeckable, since it costs 1, but low blowout potential.
Zealous Strike (C) - Excellent blowout potential. Blows apart multi-blocks, breaks bond pairs before they do damage (in all but the obvious two cases :p) and is a big enough effect to save almost any creature in 1-on-1 combat. Also saves stuff from most removal.
Fleeting Distraction (C) - Very low blowout potential, but it replaces itself and is super cheap, so probably maindeckable anyway.
Peel from Reality (C) - Good blowout potential, since it reliably breaks bond pairs and saves your guys at the same time. The real power of this is in creating tempo with ETB stuff like Mistraven, though.
Vanishment (U) - It's Boomerang for two and a half times the price. It's disappointing as a miracle, since your upkeep is almost never when you want to bounce stuff, but at 5 mana it's basically unplayable.
Death Wind (C) - Low-ish blowout potential. It's kinda expensive and hard not to telegraph, and only really kills something for quite a bit of mana. It's fine as removal, but won't surprise anyone.
Human Frailty (C) - Decent blowout potential, but this is another card that will surely overperform at the prerelease but not really be that good as people learn to predict it.
Necrobite (C) - Gaze of the Gorgon for 1 less mana and no second color shenanigans. Decent blowout potential, but, like its predecessor, easy to predict and lots of outs to it.
Aggravate (U) - Low blowout potential midcombat, but maybe makes up for it by being a Panic Attack? Should end lots of games.
Banners Raised (C) - Very low blowout potential.
Rush of Blood (U) - Low-ish blowout potential.
Thunderbolt (C) - Very low blowout potential.
Thunderous Wrath (R) - See Banishing Stroke, except moreso.
Uncanny Speed (C) - Low blowout potential.
Eaten by Spiders (U) - Low blowout potential, but out of the sideboard, has a lot of promise.
Joint Assault (C) - Very high blowout potential. Excellent card.
Snare the Skies (C) - Low-ish blowout potential. People will be expecting flying hate from people and this is about the weakest of them.
Sheltering Word (C) - Extremely low blowout potential.
Terrifying Presence (C) - High-ish blowout potential, but so awful in so many situations that I would probably not maindeck it. Depends on how cluttered board states tend to get in the format. Kinda like a weak Moonmist that works outside of werewolves.
Wolfir Avenger (U) - Very high blowout potential. Amazing card.
Yup, I've been thinking about that, too.
Scrapskin Drake is also a good fit since this is a deck where being unable to block shouldn't be a big deal.
I'm slightly concerned at the potential for ending up with too few creatures though - seems like there isn't much redundancy in terms of the cards you need to see to make it work.
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I tried to limit the list to playable/moderately playable commons and uncommons that would definitely vie for space in a deck (no Farbog Explorer), but there are some rare offenders too! (Silverblade Paladin, Dark Imposter, Captain of the Mists, Wild Defiance, Somberwald Sage, Druid's Repository, Champion of Lambholt). Green may be the worst offender, but blue is hogging up some 3cmc too. Perhaps I'm just imagining things though. Keep in mind however that it seems there are many more filler cards that take up the slot too (previously mentioned Farbog Explorer, Trusted Forcemage, Necrobite, etc, etc) Thoughts?
Even tacking Angel's Tomb on there as a creature, I'm not sure I'd call that packed. White and blue particularly are 3-drop shy. You're going to have a very hard time filling in your curve if you're in Bant colors.
Indeed not - it's fewer than Innistrad!
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Probably not. I suspect that Black/Green will generally be a terrible color combination; black has a major loner/sacrifice your stuff theme, and green has a major soulbond/lots of creatures helping each other theme. Feels very anti-synergistic.
I basically just think Triumph of Ferocity is good, no need to get cute with it. Looking at the set's common and uncommon creatures, having the biggest creature should be even easier than normal for green decks in this format. Phyrexian Arena is nuts, and a conditional Arena is still excellent when the condition is easy to achieve. Seems good.
Just so you don't get yourself blown out at the pre-release, Scalding Devil can only target players. Which makes it a lot worse.
If your question is "What would a judge do is this situation?", only one person's answer is relevant, and that is the Head Judge at your event. I can quote the rules, but I don't know your HJ.
Blue's common creatures are excellent:
Mist Raven, Gryff Vanguard and Elgaud Shieldmate are all already very good in a vacuum.
If you're able to combine them with blink effects, like Cloudshift, Ghostly Flicker and Nephalia Smuggler, they become better. Creatures with ETB effects also decent with Peel from Reality and Emancipation Angel.
Tandem Lookout obviously works well with evasive creatures and bounce.
Scrapskin Drake, Mist Raven and Gryff Vanguard are all excellent flyers at common, and so is Seraph of the Dawn. If you can pick up Elgaud Shieldmate and Nearheath Pilgrim for the hexproof/lifelink soulbonding, you can end up with very nasty flyers.
Mist Raven and Gryff Vanguard also combine nicely with Peel from Reality, Ghostly Flicker and Cloudshift, while Crippling Chill and Into the Void help push through damage.
The trouble with W/U is that the curve looks horrible if you just throw in all the best cards. Clearly the power is there, it's a question of how to survive long enough to exploit it. As erebus91 pointed out earlier, cards like Angelic Wall might turn out to be quite critical to making it work.
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