Yay, one more Commander I can finally foil out. Super excited for this one! Also, proper Kobolds of Kher Keep tokens (I just use the actualy card as my token right now.)
If Paper Magic dies out completely and transitions to Digital, I probably won't follow. I've tried digital only card games, and while they're fun and enjoyable, I just don't like the idea that if the game dies, I won't be able to play it again if their servers don't exist. At least I can still playing Paper magic with my friends and significant other even if the game dies. I still play some dead TCGs, and occasionally pick up cards for them, as I still have fun playing them, even if they haven't been in print for years.
Doubt i'll ever quit Magic, just won't switch to digital only.
I have this issue sometimes too. I have 15 commander decks right now, with decklists ready for 5 more, and a few more ideas in my head. With my current carry solution, I can bring my binder, a playmat, dice, 8 Commander decks, and my Planechase planes. Now, I don;t usually play every deck each time I go to the card shop (once a week, usually play 3 - 7 games depending on attendance and opponents) My problem comes from selection. Sometimes I want to play certain archetypes based on opponents generals for either challenge reasons, or interesting matchups, And I feel everytime this happens the deck I want to play is at home. Been looking into a few things myself.
Someone at my game store went to The Home Depot and got a large hand held plastic box made to carry small components. Inside this case is 10 - 12 yellow bins that don't move when it's closed, and is enough room to fit a single sleeved Commander deck with a little room left over. I've also seen some smaller leather carriers on Card Kingdom that carry 1350 cards (can't remember if it's sleeved or not) but you could realistically carry 8 - 12 Commander decks comfortably in that if you don't care about individual deck boxes, or don't use actual cardboard tokens for everything like I do.
If you don't need to bring large card binders, a larger sized backpack could carry 14 decks easy (if I didn't bring my massive trade binder everywhere, I could fit another 9+ decks in my backpack)
Nath is just ramping. By turn 5 he has 12 creatures, including a Priest of Titania, and a Gaea's Cradle out. Doran hits me on turn 4 with a Slagwurm Armor equipped Doran, putting me 1 turn out of losing the game. Scarab God hasn't done much beyond removal.
I had played a Sakura-Tribe Elder, removed with Innocent Blood by Scarab God (also affected Nath, not too big a deal), Was saving it to block Doran, got smacked for 11. Nath guy left me alone, was focused on ramping. Played out a Viscera Seer that had to block Doran to not lose the game. By this time, Scarab God has never played a creature, but Doran kept attacking me even when I had creatures. Finally I played Archfiend of Depravity to try and bring Elf Ramp back down to our level. Scarab God has 0 creatures, and Doran only had Doran, so, not going to affect either of them right away. Before my end step it gets bounced to my hand from Scarab God, leaving me open to death from Doran. At that point, I just decided that they didn't want me in the game, so, I decided to scoop.
I very rarely scoop games, only if I need to leave, or something happens that requires me to end the game. But, I just really felt like if they didn't want me to play this game, they should have told me ahead of time, instead of just ganging up on me to remove me from the game as fast as possible. Was a waste of my time, and a waste of their resources that could have gone to dealing with the Elf Ramp guy who won 3 turns later with a 50+ damage Exsanguinate
Honestly I'm probably just going to play with Contraptions. Not sure if there's any cards in any of the sets that I want to use beyond ones that build contraptions.
I have thought of running this in my own Daxos build. It's very much a proactive card, like Ghostly Prison, as opposed to something reactive like Path to Exile. Honestly, I would never cut every reactive piece of removal in my deck just for the Enchantment synergy, however, I have thought of running this one, as it's much easier to recur in this deck, and it can definitely make someone think twice about attacking you, especially with something important.
Honestly, looking at your last deck list post, my suggestion would be cutting Death Grasp. While the life gain can be useful, you have other, much better, sources of single target removal with Path to Exile, Utter End, and Mortify.
Another card I use beyond what you have in the deck to discourage attacks, and also can work to make combat a nightmare for your opponents, is Archetype of Finality. While it's expensive, it can be very effective.
Super excited I have one of these pre-ordered at MSRP. I was already excited just knowing Liliana, Delver, and Huntmaster, but this list is insane for me. Sure, the Ixalan Card could have been better, but, theres always a few misses in these FTV, and I feel the rest of the set MORE than makes up for that. Almost all of these cards are ones I was looking at picking up for decks, so, slam dunk for me.
I started in 4th edition, so, a 4th edition Starter Deck. It was awful 5 color jank. Thankfully, I was quickly able to buy some Ice Age, and some 5th Edition when it came out, and molded it into a Green/White creature deck. It was bad. My first real competitive deck (beyond building exact copies of World Champs decks) was U/G Madness (I was a very very casual player until then). A friend let me use it at FNM, and I won the whole tourney with it, and I split the prize with the friend who lent me the deck, and in return, he let me keep the deck.
If I were to pick up the Ur-Dragon deck, and Modify the landbase myself without using expensive lands, this is what I would run. I will also put in my ramp/mana fixing package.
Now, this does mean 50% of the deck is based on mana, but, you are running a 9 mana commander in a tribe of massively costed creatures. Of course, depending on what you run for creatures, you could drop Cryptolith Rite if you aren't running the smaller Dragon support creatures, or don't feel it will have enough impact. Of the cards in my list, the only one over $5 is Chromatic Lantern which is worth the price of picking up (around $10 - 15). The Farseek, Spoils of Victory and Krosan Verge have 9 Dual Land targets to get, as well as all the basics. 5 of those dual lands have a chance of coming into play untapped due to the amount of Basics in the deck. This mana base also only has 8 Lands that have to come into play tapped (10 if you include Evolving Wilds/Terramorphic Expanse), which matches the 10 Tri Lands. With 25 sources of green mana in the early game (26 if you include Cascading Cataract for later) you should be able to consistently cast these Ramp spells and fix your mana better.
Now, if you had more income, obviously Fetches and Shocks would be a better way to go, and should be your final goal for the deck. Also Prismatic Omen if worth investing in to have a second card like Chromatic Lantern. Hope this helps!
Retailers probably pushing Wizards. If products aren't moving fast enough at the advertised prices, those products aren't going to be on the shelves long. I'd have to imagine sales of Magic are down from their peak of a few years ago.
Big box stores generally lease the shelf space for products like TCGs out to third party companies you've never heard of. Target doesn't actually care if the Magic cards don't move, it would be the third-party that cares.
Yea, this is the case as far as I know for Target and Walmart. Anyone who has ever gone into one of these stores near launch of a new Product only to find it not there, and asked an employee will know when they say a Vendor comes in to stock the TCG/Card section. Also, I'd love it if my LGS would adopt these prices. I don't buy sealed product much anymore (and it's usually things like Duel Decks, Commander Decks, FTV which I preorder from my LGS anyways, or Drafts played at my LGS) and part of it is because of I can't afford to spend much on Magic anymore, so i'd rather not play the booster pack lottery. But, when I have bought boxes (usually splitting with people to draft) it's usually purchased online because my LGS does no discount on booster boxes unless you pre-order the box before the set launches.
Sensei's Divining Top - i opened so much Kami and swear that thing felt like it was the first Mythic.
See, I had the exact opposite experience. I feel like every single draft I did I got a Top in at least 1 of the packs. By the time Kamigawa rotated out of standard (as did I, as I took a break from Magic around then) I had about 16 Tops. Then again, I was also the person who opened 6 Cranial Extractions in under a week (which was the most expensive Rare in the set at the time). Needless to say, I was pretty happy when I came back to Magic and started playing Commander that I had all these Tops.
Thanks for all the feedback everyone. Honestly, I think I may actually be testing the card out. I never ran Rotlung Reanimator in the deck due to lack of Clerics, I already run Corpse Harvester and Rooftop Storm in the deck, and I have a regular in my group who plays a very, very strong Sliver deck. Honestly, just having some weird options based on what i'm already playing, and what I play against, I'm thinking of testing it. Some of the possibilities covered here has made it at least worth testing.
So, I run a Grimgrin, Corpse-Born Zombie EDH/Commander deck, and, lately, there have been quite a few good to great Zombie support creatures that are not zombies themselves (The Scarab God, Gisa and Geralf, etc). The main theme of my zombie deck is using it's overwhelming number of "Lords" (Death Baron, Cemetery Reaper, etc) to pump my army, as well as running some strong token generators. Now, I do run a few non-zombie cards in the deck, so, the questions are:
1.) Do you think it's worth it to run this card at all, at any threshold of non-zombie creatures (or non-whatever tribe you're running)
2.) If yes, what do you think is the point where there are too few targets for it to matter, and too many that you depend too much on the card to get any synergy?
Doubt i'll ever quit Magic, just won't switch to digital only.
Someone at my game store went to The Home Depot and got a large hand held plastic box made to carry small components. Inside this case is 10 - 12 yellow bins that don't move when it's closed, and is enough room to fit a single sleeved Commander deck with a little room left over. I've also seen some smaller leather carriers on Card Kingdom that carry 1350 cards (can't remember if it's sleeved or not) but you could realistically carry 8 - 12 Commander decks comfortably in that if you don't care about individual deck boxes, or don't use actual cardboard tokens for everything like I do.
If you don't need to bring large card binders, a larger sized backpack could carry 14 decks easy (if I didn't bring my massive trade binder everywhere, I could fit another 9+ decks in my backpack)
Hope this helps!
Other night I was playing a 4 man Pod. Kresh the Bloodbraided (Me), Doran, the Siege Tower Good Stuff w/ large toughness, The Scarab God Zombies, Nath of the Gilt-Leaf Elf Ramp.
Nath is just ramping. By turn 5 he has 12 creatures, including a Priest of Titania, and a Gaea's Cradle out. Doran hits me on turn 4 with a Slagwurm Armor equipped Doran, putting me 1 turn out of losing the game. Scarab God hasn't done much beyond removal.
I had played a Sakura-Tribe Elder, removed with Innocent Blood by Scarab God (also affected Nath, not too big a deal), Was saving it to block Doran, got smacked for 11. Nath guy left me alone, was focused on ramping. Played out a Viscera Seer that had to block Doran to not lose the game. By this time, Scarab God has never played a creature, but Doran kept attacking me even when I had creatures. Finally I played Archfiend of Depravity to try and bring Elf Ramp back down to our level. Scarab God has 0 creatures, and Doran only had Doran, so, not going to affect either of them right away. Before my end step it gets bounced to my hand from Scarab God, leaving me open to death from Doran. At that point, I just decided that they didn't want me in the game, so, I decided to scoop.
I very rarely scoop games, only if I need to leave, or something happens that requires me to end the game. But, I just really felt like if they didn't want me to play this game, they should have told me ahead of time, instead of just ganging up on me to remove me from the game as fast as possible. Was a waste of my time, and a waste of their resources that could have gone to dealing with the Elf Ramp guy who won 3 turns later with a 50+ damage Exsanguinate
Honestly, looking at your last deck list post, my suggestion would be cutting Death Grasp. While the life gain can be useful, you have other, much better, sources of single target removal with Path to Exile, Utter End, and Mortify.
Another card I use beyond what you have in the deck to discourage attacks, and also can work to make combat a nightmare for your opponents, is Archetype of Finality. While it's expensive, it can be very effective.
hope this helps!
Unfortunately, I haven't updated since Dragons of Tarkir and Magic Origins, slowly trying to gather the cards I need to update.
1 Path of Ancestry
1 Opal Palace
1 Mirrodin's Core
1 Haven of the Spirit Dragon
1 City of Brass
1 Transguild Promenade
1 Rupture Spire
1 Evolving Wilds
1 Terramorphic Expanse
1 Forbidden Orchard
1 Cascading Cataracts
1 Unclaimed Territory
1 Canopy Vista
1 Cinder Glade
1 Prairie Stream
1 Smoldering Marsh
1 Sunken Hollow
1 Canyon Slough
1 Irrigated Farmland
1 Scattered Groves
1 Sheltered Thicket
1 Krosan Verge
1 Homeward Path
6 Forest
2 Mountain
2 Swamp
2 Island
2 Plains
1 Spoils of Victory
1 Kodama's Reach
1 Cultivate
1 Sol Ring
1 Mind Stone
1 Thought Vessel
1 Coldsteel Heart
1 Darksteel Ingot
1 Commander's Sphere
1 Chromatic Lantern
1 Cryptolith Rite
Now, this does mean 50% of the deck is based on mana, but, you are running a 9 mana commander in a tribe of massively costed creatures. Of course, depending on what you run for creatures, you could drop Cryptolith Rite if you aren't running the smaller Dragon support creatures, or don't feel it will have enough impact. Of the cards in my list, the only one over $5 is Chromatic Lantern which is worth the price of picking up (around $10 - 15). The Farseek, Spoils of Victory and Krosan Verge have 9 Dual Land targets to get, as well as all the basics. 5 of those dual lands have a chance of coming into play untapped due to the amount of Basics in the deck. This mana base also only has 8 Lands that have to come into play tapped (10 if you include Evolving Wilds/Terramorphic Expanse), which matches the 10 Tri Lands. With 25 sources of green mana in the early game (26 if you include Cascading Cataract for later) you should be able to consistently cast these Ramp spells and fix your mana better.
Now, if you had more income, obviously Fetches and Shocks would be a better way to go, and should be your final goal for the deck. Also Prismatic Omen if worth investing in to have a second card like Chromatic Lantern. Hope this helps!
I can definitely see this being standard playable. I doubt it'll be a 4 of in many decks, but I can see a 2-3 in anything that runs big beats.
Yea, this is the case as far as I know for Target and Walmart. Anyone who has ever gone into one of these stores near launch of a new Product only to find it not there, and asked an employee will know when they say a Vendor comes in to stock the TCG/Card section. Also, I'd love it if my LGS would adopt these prices. I don't buy sealed product much anymore (and it's usually things like Duel Decks, Commander Decks, FTV which I preorder from my LGS anyways, or Drafts played at my LGS) and part of it is because of I can't afford to spend much on Magic anymore, so i'd rather not play the booster pack lottery. But, when I have bought boxes (usually splitting with people to draft) it's usually purchased online because my LGS does no discount on booster boxes unless you pre-order the box before the set launches.
See, I had the exact opposite experience. I feel like every single draft I did I got a Top in at least 1 of the packs. By the time Kamigawa rotated out of standard (as did I, as I took a break from Magic around then) I had about 16 Tops. Then again, I was also the person who opened 6 Cranial Extractions in under a week (which was the most expensive Rare in the set at the time). Needless to say, I was pretty happy when I came back to Magic and started playing Commander that I had all these Tops.
So, I run a Grimgrin, Corpse-Born Zombie EDH/Commander deck, and, lately, there have been quite a few good to great Zombie support creatures that are not zombies themselves (The Scarab God, Gisa and Geralf, etc). The main theme of my zombie deck is using it's overwhelming number of "Lords" (Death Baron, Cemetery Reaper, etc) to pump my army, as well as running some strong token generators. Now, I do run a few non-zombie cards in the deck, so, the questions are:
1.) Do you think it's worth it to run this card at all, at any threshold of non-zombie creatures (or non-whatever tribe you're running)
2.) If yes, what do you think is the point where there are too few targets for it to matter, and too many that you depend too much on the card to get any synergy?
As far as what I am currently running for Non-Zombies in my list:
- Solemn Simulacrum
- The Scarab God
- Gisa and Geralf
- Ghoulcaller Gisa
- Grave Titan
- Duplicant
- Sheoldred, Whispering One