I am intrigued by the new card Demonic Pact and have made a new deck based around it. It is pretty much built to win off the Demonic Pact as I reuse it over and over. There IS a cheesy way I have to donate it to another player if I have to, but there are only two cards in the deck that do that (last resort). Please keep two things in mind: 1. This is NOT a tournament competitive deck, but just a fun casual dueling deck. I have no doubt any tournament Modern or Legacy deck would run through it. 2. I've been playing forever, so I have playsets of all these cards, including all the dual lands that go with the Esper colors, so I'm not spending any money to make it ... just traded for the Demonic Pacts and threw it together.
The other night we had a question on a ruling given by a judge regarding this. My opponent attacked with a 7/4 death touch trampler, and I blocked with a 4/7 indestructible creature. The judge said since 1 pt was all the death touch creature would normally need to kill the creature and it had trample, that I should take 6 pts of trample damage. Since it was just a casual game I didn't argue (much) but did say this seemed odd since indestructible creatures don't die from pt damage. Does this sound right?
Things that bother me greatly in multiplayer games:
1. Players that take very long turns each time (usually blue players); We used to play with this one guy who turns took so incredibly long I went out and bought a timer just for him and would force him to take his turn in less than 60 seconds, much to the approval of all other players at the table.
2. People that don't pay attention to the cards or when it's their turn and then 'notice' something in play they would have countered or killed earlier. If everyone is watching every play...how do you miss much?? Those players also draw the game out asking questions they should know the answer to already.
3. A table full of 6 people ...4 of which have White or Green decks and no disenchants ...to take care of some artifact or enchantment the whole board is losing to. Then when you ask them 'Do you have any disenchants in your deck?' they say 'I don't know'. How do you not know what's in your deck??
4. And the ABSOLUTE worst... a player who either hard targets one guy for 10-15 pts of damage or plays a Wrath or Armageddon and then next play 'Oops..there is my ride' or 'I have to go ...sorry.. I can't finish'. What a douche. We have gone back and 'negated' his spells in those instances ...putting our lands or creatures back in play, after instructing him not to start a multiplayer game ever again he can't finish.
That's idiotic. Why would they complain you have TOO many decks?? What do they care? That's much better than one person playing the exact same deck over and over and over for 8 hours. That gets uber boring. We almost exclude people that that only have one or two decks, or usually just lend them decks to play. Otherwise ...if someone was playing the same deck over and over, say one that is mostly counter... I would get my deck where nothing can be countered... and play that every time. They would then get the idea to bring more to the table.
I've been playing casual multiplayer games since before Ice Age. I prefer those to Standard competition where everyone just looks online and gets the best Net deck they can afford. We generally have MUCH more decks than most players; I had about 90 decks and recently cut it down to about 60, mostly due to the fact that unfortunately our causal multiplayer games (4-6 players) are dieing out and it's just dueling or Standard FNM play. I have a few decks that are lock out decks, and a couple that are 'I win' decks too ... but that is maybe 4 or 5 decks out of 60. None of those are 1st or 2nd turn either. The main problem is others are not playing Disenchants. Those are MANDATORY in a multiplayer game, and if all other players are not running any, than you WILL lose to an artifact or enchantment you can't deal with. Knowing this, if you are making a causal 'free for all' deck the FIRST few cards, if playing those colors, should be disenchant type cards. Also if you recognize someone is playing their 'I win automatically' deck ...gang up on them right away. If they can hold off 4 people by themselves, the other players only have themselves to blame. I expect everyone to shoot for me when I play one of those decks. If you have a lot of decks and are not playing that one same deck over and over (which we hate to see, for Gods sakes if you are going to play for 4-8 hours ...bring a decent amount of decks), I don't mind losing to any one deck ONE time in a night. Even Capsize/Tradewind Rider or a Megrem deck, although I prefer not playing against those. Just mix it up and only play each deck once a night if you can. Those that say they can't afford that ...make more pauper decks.
I don't own any entombs but Buried Alive's are already in there .... more mind reading going on. I guess I should have posted everything I have put in it already. I like the Withered Wretches cause they are a bear (quicker casting) and can get stuff out of your opponents graveyard too. I could always take the Creakwood Lieges out and put in more fattys. Creatures that do stuff when they come into play, or removal creatures (Avatar of Woe, etc)then ways to sack them to get them back in the graveyard. (lands like Miren the Moaning Well or Grim Backwoods). With green/black I have access to putrefy, Pernicious deeds or the new Granite Gaze for good removal ...but then I have to take out creatures.
Wow .... you guys are reading my mind! Usually when I want to ramp up with green I use a Wood Elves and Skyshroud Claim combo. They both let you put duel lands into play untapped ....my fav mana fixers and they get you to 6 or 7 mana pretty quickly. Unfortunately that takes up 2 'slots' of cards (4 each) and the deck is already kind of weak on removal (which I prefer to be strong in). I had planned on using Dark Rituals for the ramp since I'm running black too. I actually pulled out Birthing Pods to put in it ...but had them to the side cause then you have to pick creatures you can 'pod' up to in casting cost. Primeval and Grave Titans were in mind, but right now it's a lots of 'one of's' such as Craterhoof Behmoth, Penumbra Wurm, Sheoldred. I had a couple of Doomgapes in there but with the multiple upkeeps you would have to be sacking multiple creatures to it so that fizzled out. The Withered Wretches let you get the lands out of the graveyard so only mostly creatures come into play. I run 3 Acidic Slimes for non creature removal ...and if those keep coming back in play it's awesome as you run through their lands. There is always Spirit Monger too. Choices....Choices...
I'm building a casual deck with Deadbridge Chant as the theme. I am using Paradox Hazes for multiple upkeeps, Rot Farm Skeletons to get more cards in the graveyard and Withered Wretches to weed out the lands from the graveyard. Just curious as to suggestions for what else I might want to put in there. I have some Duplicants and Fleshbag Marauders for creature control and a few ways to sack my creatures back to the graveyard. As of right now I'm running 4 Creekwood Lieges cause they work with the Paradox Hazes so well. Any other ideas?
Reminds me of the days when the white deck got Karma out against the black deck, and if he didn't have a Nevy's disk ...it was game over pretty quickly for the black deck. Deck hosing cards force a solid color deck to splash or change just to deal with whatever is popular and powerful they can't handle currently. If you can't handle hexproof ....splash so you then can. Nothing new there.
IMHO I think Hexproof is the single most powerful ability. If you can't target my creature and I can then you either have to edict it away or mass remove it; which really cuts down on your chances of killing it. I love it, but can easily see why others hate it as it's too easy to put 'all eggs in one basket' on a hexproof creature and just smash. Even though Autumn Willow in essence had it first, remember how often you groaned at seeing Rancor attached to Ascetic Troll... and all you had was targeted removal?
Demonic Pact deck
4 Demonic pacts
4 Copy Enchantment
4 Vindicates
4 Detention Sphere
4 Supreme Verdict
2 Puca’s Mischief
2 Replenish
1 Chain of Vapor
1 Renounce
1 Teferi’s Cure/Arenson’s Aura
1 Demonic Tutor
28 spells
4 Academy Rector
3 Flicker Wisp
3 Glimmerpoint Stag
Venser
Barrin, Master Wizard
12 Creatures
Lands- all dual lands, Serra Sanctums, Esper lands, etc
1. Players that take very long turns each time (usually blue players); We used to play with this one guy who turns took so incredibly long I went out and bought a timer just for him and would force him to take his turn in less than 60 seconds, much to the approval of all other players at the table.
2. People that don't pay attention to the cards or when it's their turn and then 'notice' something in play they would have countered or killed earlier. If everyone is watching every play...how do you miss much?? Those players also draw the game out asking questions they should know the answer to already.
3. A table full of 6 people ...4 of which have White or Green decks and no disenchants ...to take care of some artifact or enchantment the whole board is losing to. Then when you ask them 'Do you have any disenchants in your deck?' they say 'I don't know'. How do you not know what's in your deck??
4. And the ABSOLUTE worst... a player who either hard targets one guy for 10-15 pts of damage or plays a Wrath or Armageddon and then next play 'Oops..there is my ride' or 'I have to go ...sorry.. I can't finish'. What a douche. We have gone back and 'negated' his spells in those instances ...putting our lands or creatures back in play, after instructing him not to start a multiplayer game ever again he can't finish.
I'm building a casual deck with Deadbridge Chant as the theme. I am using Paradox Hazes for multiple upkeeps, Rot Farm Skeletons to get more cards in the graveyard and Withered Wretches to weed out the lands from the graveyard. Just curious as to suggestions for what else I might want to put in there. I have some Duplicants and Fleshbag Marauders for creature control and a few ways to sack my creatures back to the graveyard. As of right now I'm running 4 Creekwood Lieges cause they work with the Paradox Hazes so well. Any other ideas?