MTG Salvation

Quote from chronocidist

Ok so it seems like people are suggesting you can use/respond to the second copy of a legendary card before it dies. For example you could play a second flagstone and then tap it before sacking it. Correct me if I'm wrong but that doesn't seem to line up with the text in the article.

"When multiple copies are on the battlefield under one player's control, that player chooses one to put into the graveyard as a state-based effect until only one remains."

In fact it doesn't even sound like they get sacked they just get put into the graveyard. I don't know if that will make a huge difference though.

Since the choosing is a state based effect it seems as though you would never get a chance to, for example, use your second flagstone.

Judging by the wording of your post you're assuming that the second legendary permanent is the one that gets sacrificed, and the original must remain in play. It's explicitly stated that that's not the case in the two articles about the rules change that were linked earlier. When you control two copies of the same legendary permanent or two planeswalkers with the same type, you choose which ones go to the graveyard as a state-based effect. It doesn't matter which one goes, as long as you only have one when you're done.

Using Flagstones of Trokair for example, Atrius was correct in their post about it. One in play, one in hand. Tap the one in play for mana, play the one from your hand, tapped one goes to the graveyard and you get your plains, and still have an untapped Flagstones.

The new planeswalker rule works the same way. If you have Liliana of the Veil in play, you can use one of her abilities, play a second one from your hand, and then use that one's abilities as well.

Now that Dragon's Maze is out, a couple things to look at are Vorel of the Hull Clade and Bred for the Hunt. The latter will help with the card drawing issues mentioned a few posts back. Also Take (Give/Take) is definitely worth looking at for card drawing.

I've been running Skinshifter as my Tarmogoyf replacement. He does a lot of work for me, to be honest. The ability to go over the top or trample through on the attack and stop anything 7 power or less on the ground has been huge. It takes a bigger investment in green to pull off but I think it's worth it if 'goyf isn't an option.

Quote from AnElfInKingArthersCourt

Cage does not keep loam in the GY, it does prevent them from flame jabbing
you which is their backup plan, it also stops them from flashing back faithless looting, but it does nothing to stop the dredge trigger on LFtL.

Your best bet is to just have 3 to 4 jund charms between your main and side.

You're correct about the Loam. That'll teach me to go by memory on cards I don't encounter very often.

Considering Canopy is only in there to provide an instant speed, non-spell method of drawing a card to get Loam out of the gy in the face of graveyard hate on the stack, you could switch in anything that cycles for one mana or less. Personally, I'm going to try to find space for a Street Wraith or two. It's not as good as Canopy because if you dredge it you can't Loam it back to your hand though.

Try to think of Canopy as a spell, not a land, and it might help you handle it a little better.

Anathemancer isn't as good against Loam as it is something like Tron, I would say. A Loam deck can run on 3-5 lands, so Anathemancer won't hit very hard on its first or second passes. Loam might run 25+ lands maindeck but once it has all its colors in play, any other lands drawn are just fuel for Assault; they're not hitting play unless it's for a specific reason (Bojuka Bog, Tec. Edge, Horizon Canopy, etc.).

Grafdigger's Cage keeps Loam in the gy, Pithing Needle naming Seismic Assault shuts it down.

Intangible Virtue seems like an obvious inclusion.

Hey everyone. I'm looking around for ideas for another Standard deck, and this one caught my eye. Does anyone have opinions of which one is more powerful and/or more fun to play? Right now I'm considering Bant Pod or BUG Pod, since I don't have the Huntmasters that really make Naya Pod tick.

Also, to the OP: I noticed in your BUG Pod section that you talk about Undying and BSZ allowing your undying creatures to live through the sweeper. According to this judge, with a rules quote to back it up, that's not the case and undying creatures with +1/+1 counters on them die to a BSZ > their toughness just like everything else:

http://blogs.magicjudges.org/rulestips/2012/02/undying-creatures-and-black-suns-zenith/

My guess would be that there are people that have started playing since Affinity was a dominant deck, and simply don't know what an affinity deck is. Those of us that were around for Mirrodin will probably always call it Affinity, though.

Flying blockers still exist. You're still looking at Arcanum Wings as a source of evasion. I only see the aura swap ability, because that's the only part of the card that matters.

You use the Invisible Stalker because it's got Hexproof, which means your opponent can't usually kill it in response to the aura swap being used. It's also unblockable, which is a plus.

You use the Blighted Agent because it's got infect, and is unblockable. It's a must-kill card if Aura Swap resolves, and an instant win if they don't deal with it, due to being an 11 power infect creature.

Edit: Regardless of which creature you use this on, 4 Arcanum Wings and 4 Eldrazi Conscription handles 8 of your 12 auras and creates a monster kill condition.

You're not using it for the evasion, you're using it to put 10 power onto an unblockable creature for three mana at instant speed. If the creature has infect it's even better.

Invisible Stalker
Arcanum Wings
Eldrazi Conscription

Seems good.

Mix in Blighted Agent for a little spice.

Yeah, that's what I've been mulling over. It lets the deck run a LOT of toolbox lands, puts another 4 shocks online, mana fixes if you're at RR on 3... I think I'm going to look at something like this:

I'll edit the sideboard when it's more finalized. Right now it's 54 cards, and I'm thinking about putting in 3 Smallpox and 3 Realms Uncharted. If I did that I'd change the lands around and put in some more utility lands like Bojuka Bog

I took a worse version of this deck, with 2 Assault and 4 Burning Vengeance, to a tournament on Sunday and split for first place. It's creatureless, but around here that's alright and seems to put my opponent on tilt from turn 1. Round 1 was against MBC. Games 2 and 3 he Cranial Extracted my Loams and I had to win the old fashioned way: Keep his board under control and burn him out a draw at a time. Granted, he had just returned to the game, but he's a pretty strong player so it was a drawn-out match. 2-1 me.

Round 2 was against mono-black vampires. If I never see another Bloodghast again it'll be too soon. This guy beat me 2-1 because Burning Vengeance + Retrace was too slow to beat him.

Round 3 was against B/R Zombies, basically a standard deck. Geralf's Messenger is a COMPLETE pain and cost me game 2. When you get to game 3, however, and have Extirpate to hit Messenger with the undying trigger on the stack it gets a little better. 2-1 me.

Round 4 was against B/G Heartless Summoning Infect. Went three games, gogo 2 Assault. :\ Garruk was the MVP in this match as he made enough beast tokens for me to hold off a pair of Phyrexian Vatmother long enough for my opponent to poison himself to death 2 turns after hitting himself with Caress of Phyrexia. 2-1 me

Top 4 I was against the Vampires player again. Loam + Assault both games made it a completely different match. A 20 minute 2-0 win for me.

At this point it was getting late, so I split with a mono-white SpecProc deck for first, but based on reports from people that had played him, he wasn't fast enough to beat me had we played it out.

Overall I'm having a lot of fun with this deck and I think it'll be my Modern deck of choice for quite a while, which means I'll be seeing a lot of hate in the future.

What do you think of Realms Uncharted? I just flipped past one the other day when I was putting this deck together and I still haven't quite decided how I feel about it yet.

In my opinion, any deck with more than two colors should play Reflecting Pool. There's no convincing reason not to. I run a playset in my Assault-Loam deck (can't really call it Aggro Loam as it's creatureless at the moment) and the only time I'm ever not happy to see it is when it's the only land in my opening hand.