This is great that this instantly becomes an example of something I was stating regarding another recent topic (keywording ETB).
The application of an action (as it's worded) changes the player's perception, and thus decides how much fantasy emulates from that action.
Bland monotone names/terms/actions, will always lack this, and thus take players out of the game and the fantasy emulation.
1. Rowanalpha was insinuating a replacement effect, not a triggered ability.
2. Mtg provides no flexibility in wording for the sake of impact. If two possible wordings of the same effect are mechanically identical, one is correct and one is incorrect. This is how mtg works.
Yes, I know, probably not the card Maro means, but for someone who always likes to be tricky with technicalities it's poor form if Mishra's melded version is actually the second. For shame, Maro.
Maybe he isn't counting that because the previous meld cards don't work in constructed.
I have been waiting so long for a Gix card, it can be pretty awful and I'll still play it in tournaments; but my shot in the dark is that the
Ward — Sacrifice a permanent
is Gix-related.
Honestly, that Ward ability is strong enough that I half-expect it to appear on melded Titania… or to be an emblem.
I don’t think it’s possible to copy a mana ability, period.
While it’s normally something specifically specified by the card (either in rules or reminder text), we got confirmation that Dynaheir doesn’t work with Cascading Cataracts this year because mana abilities can’t be copied within the rules of mtg… or I believe that was the rationale (I’m pretty sure that copy effects can only copy permanents and things on the stack).
They could have put tron lands in the set but immediately and say they're just legal in standard. They banned that spellslinger otter when Ikoria came out in some format. Could have done it with tron lands too?
Lutri isn't banned in any format that Wizards officially runs the banlist for.
It's not? I thought it was banned day one?
In commander, which wizards doesn’t run the banlist for.
I’d much rather have wizards consider non-rotating formats when deciding what to include rather than going back to the “We’ll print whatever and ban what doesn’t work” approach of Eldraine… and that’s coming from someone who likes Eldraine.
So… there are two main ways to do this:
1. Create a new keyword that means “when this card enters the battlefield”
2. Creating a new action word like mill, essentially replacing the words “enters the battlefield” with “arrives” everywhere in the game.
I personally support the second way. It saves space on cards without turning it into the most popular keyword in the game. It would also let us save space within other abilities as well (Landfall could read “whenever a land arrives under your control,” for example).
Tron lands would be potentially meaningless in Standard. Really what payoffs are there? Other formats they can be problematic, as for Standard what exactly would it hurt?
They dropped the ball, period.
Dude, you just provided your own explanation. Wizards doesn’t want Tron lands in historic and pioneer so they aren’t adding them to standard.
Wizards actually caring for the health of nonrotating formats by not printing potentially problematic cards is typically seen as a GOOD thing, ya know?
Apologies for the delay in this response. I'm going to be going over my general recommendations in a couple of steps, including a possible decklist:
Possible challenges with the list:
1. You play a lot of cards that require a high level of risk. Suicide decks that pay life work as you start with 40 but the idea isn't to be caught with an abyssal persecuter that you have no way to sacrifice (remember that Rakdos does NOT let you sacrifice demons)... or for your burning inquiry to rip the reanimation spell and tutor from your hand rather than dropping the demons you wanted to reanimate... or to instantly lose the turn you go off with repay in kind when someone uses generous gift on your lich... or for your opponents to get more use out of mass hysteria than you end up getting (remember that in a 4-player game, the majority of creatures on the board likely won't be yours unless you're a heavy token deck. Even a suicide deck can engage in risk management.
2. Your strategy is very feast and famine. Even when you succeed in bringing back a big thing on turn 2-3, it seems like a large part of your strategy kind of falls apart if any opponent draws one or two removal spells and you have packed no protection beyond a single Malakir Rebirth (unless you are counting the reanimation package as "protection", I gues).
3. Even when it works, the deck is slow. Several cards in your deck like sheoldred, whispering one, scourge of the throne, bloodspeaker, or your commander will often need to wait for a bit before they have paid themselves off... which again puts you at risk if your opponents are playing interactions. Also, nearly any reanimation target from this deck would take a good number of turns to wipe out three other players. While a reanimated sire of insanity may lead to a slow victory if no player draws what they need, you are otherwise giving your opponents quite a bit of time to respond.
4. You yourself have next to no forms of interaction in the entire deck. You need ways to stop opponents that extend beyond discard effects and Sheoldred/Pestilence Demon
Possible Recommendations for the Deck:
1. Adding a Protection Package: Rakdos is a very scary commander. If you get it on the board and it starts hitting players, you can quickly get players into a place where the game ends if none of them draw incredibly cheap answers... but it will often have to live a couple of turn cycles before you have devastated everyone. There is no worse feeling than having your Rakdos exiled with swords to plowshares after you have sacrificed half of your stuff and before you have hit someone. For that purpose, here's a couple of protection Recommendations: Deflecting Swat: Is an absolutely free way to protect your stuff when your commander is out on the field. No reason not to use if you can afford it. Bolt Bend: Will generally cost only 1 mana for a similar effect and gets that low cost when protecting most of your high-end creatures, whether or not Rakdos is on the field. Not of This World: When protecting your commander, this is a free colorless counterspell. Swiftfoot Boots/Lightning Greaves: Very cheap and long-term protection against targeted removal. It's also a pretty good as a haste provider as it is fairly rare that you'd be pushing out two big demons onto the battlefield in the same turn and you can simply equip this on the card most recently played or reanimated.
2. A Haste Package: Similarly, Rakdos does it's best work when he's able to come down and swings right away. Mass Hysteria has the chance to blow up in your face as mentioned above and anger, while fine, may feel bad if you are putting it into the graveyard instead of using that opportunity to shove a reanimation target there. I've already mentioned the boots and greaves above but another two possible candidates include:
1. Herald of Slaanesh: All of your demons not only gain haste but cost 2 less. This card makes hardcasting and swinging with Rakdos on turn 4 a fairly simple manner.
2. Chainer, Nighmare Adept: This card does a surprising amount. It gives haste to your commander and to reanimated targets, it lets you cast creatures from your graveyard, and it's a discard outlet to boot.
3. An Interaction Package: Doing your own thing is all well and good but you still want to have ways to interact with foes if they get a fast start, get down stax pieces to slow you down, or threaten to combo off. Possible Recommendations include:
1. Deadly Rollick: Free exile removal if your commander is out.
2. Feed the Swarm: One of the few pieces of enchantment removal you have access to.
3. Hagra Mauling + Shatterskull Smashing : Removal that can double as a land is awesome.
4. Chaos Warp: A risky card but it can potentially remove anything.
5. Tibalt's Trickery: A red counterspell as an emergency panic button.
6. Vandalblast: A specialized artifact removal spell.
7. Toxic Deluge + Blasphemous Act: The best mass removal options in these colors, in case someone else is swarming the board.
Mana Production: Just a couple of pieces that may have been missed:
1. Dockside Extortionist: The best piece of red ramp in the game.
2. Jeska's Will: The second-best piece of red ramp in the game.
3. Black Market Connections: One of the best black cards out there. It draws cards, adds mana, creates 3/2 creatures that count as demons. This thing does it all.
4. Bolas's Citadel: While not "mana production" in the traditional sense, this card lets you pay life instead of mana costs and plays very well into the type of strategy that you have been going for.
Recommendations for Rakdos: a few specialized recommendatiosn for this deck: Thrilling Encore Another way to get back what your opponents have sacrificed other than Tergrid. Mayhem Devil: A way to turn all of those sacrifices (yours and your opponents) into damage that might sweep the board or knock the few life opponents have left. Bloodthirster or Balor: Mono-red demons with fairly bit impact that are both designed for multiplayer. Raphael, Fiendish Savior + Shadowspear: Convenient ways to gain back some of the life you've been paying that aren't named "Gray Merchant". Liliana's Contract: An outright win condition for any deck with a demon subtheme. Crucible of Worlds: The only way for you to replay those lands you are doubtless sacrificing to your own Rakdos Triggers.
Thanks for sharing. Wondering about the price for the 12 set booster Compleat Bundle. 50 percent more cards, wonder if it will be more than 50 percent more pricey or not.
I suspect it will contain a 1 in 10 chance of an ORIGINAL New Phyrexia card, and will therefore cost $200.
It costs 80 bucks instead of 45. Prices are up on Amazon.
I am 100% convinced that it will come with 2 phyrexian foil lands of each basic land type and that may be a sufficient draw for some. Maybe the two foil mythic promos will be worth something but I will be a bit surprised if so.
If a source would add more than one mana to a player’s mana pool, that player instead loses life equal to the difference and adds one mana of any color.
I’m sure that you can use the rules of grammar and math to show that the intended function of your card can be discerned through context. Can you make this ability work in the strict rules language of MTG, though?
Wait a minute… if the big stone in the middle is the main powerstone that broke in half, the stone to the right is the weak stone, and the stone to the left is the mightstone… what is that stone floating up in the middle?
"One thing we never previously told you about the Brothers' War...Gix got ahold of a third powerstone piece."
If Teferi gets embroiled in things and ends up grabbing a third powerstone piece, I’m going to lose my cool and start laughing like a madman… more than normal, I mean.
Wait a minute… if the big stone in the middle is the main powerstone that broke in half, the stone to the right is the weak stone, and the stone to the left is the mightstone… what is that stone floating up in the middle?
1. Rowanalpha was insinuating a replacement effect, not a triggered ability.
2. Mtg provides no flexibility in wording for the sake of impact. If two possible wordings of the same effect are mechanically identical, one is correct and one is incorrect. This is how mtg works.
Honestly, that Ward ability is strong enough that I half-expect it to appear on melded Titania… or to be an emblem.
While it’s normally something specifically specified by the card (either in rules or reminder text), we got confirmation that Dynaheir doesn’t work with Cascading Cataracts this year because mana abilities can’t be copied within the rules of mtg… or I believe that was the rationale (I’m pretty sure that copy effects can only copy permanents and things on the stack).
In commander, which wizards doesn’t run the banlist for.
I’d much rather have wizards consider non-rotating formats when deciding what to include rather than going back to the “We’ll print whatever and ban what doesn’t work” approach of Eldraine… and that’s coming from someone who likes Eldraine.
1. Create a new keyword that means “when this card enters the battlefield”
2. Creating a new action word like mill, essentially replacing the words “enters the battlefield” with “arrives” everywhere in the game.
I personally support the second way. It saves space on cards without turning it into the most popular keyword in the game. It would also let us save space within other abilities as well (Landfall could read “whenever a land arrives under your control,” for example).
Dude, you just provided your own explanation. Wizards doesn’t want Tron lands in historic and pioneer so they aren’t adding them to standard.
Wizards actually caring for the health of nonrotating formats by not printing potentially problematic cards is typically seen as a GOOD thing, ya know?
They already confirmed no Urza lands in this set. While the flavor is good, I really don’t think that Tron needs to be added to more formats.
Possible challenges with the list:
1. You play a lot of cards that require a high level of risk. Suicide decks that pay life work as you start with 40 but the idea isn't to be caught with an abyssal persecuter that you have no way to sacrifice (remember that Rakdos does NOT let you sacrifice demons)... or for your burning inquiry to rip the reanimation spell and tutor from your hand rather than dropping the demons you wanted to reanimate... or to instantly lose the turn you go off with repay in kind when someone uses generous gift on your lich... or for your opponents to get more use out of mass hysteria than you end up getting (remember that in a 4-player game, the majority of creatures on the board likely won't be yours unless you're a heavy token deck. Even a suicide deck can engage in risk management.
2. Your strategy is very feast and famine. Even when you succeed in bringing back a big thing on turn 2-3, it seems like a large part of your strategy kind of falls apart if any opponent draws one or two removal spells and you have packed no protection beyond a single Malakir Rebirth (unless you are counting the reanimation package as "protection", I gues).
3. Even when it works, the deck is slow. Several cards in your deck like sheoldred, whispering one, scourge of the throne, bloodspeaker, or your commander will often need to wait for a bit before they have paid themselves off... which again puts you at risk if your opponents are playing interactions. Also, nearly any reanimation target from this deck would take a good number of turns to wipe out three other players. While a reanimated sire of insanity may lead to a slow victory if no player draws what they need, you are otherwise giving your opponents quite a bit of time to respond.
4. You yourself have next to no forms of interaction in the entire deck. You need ways to stop opponents that extend beyond discard effects and Sheoldred/Pestilence Demon
Possible Recommendations for the Deck:
1. Adding a Protection Package: Rakdos is a very scary commander. If you get it on the board and it starts hitting players, you can quickly get players into a place where the game ends if none of them draw incredibly cheap answers... but it will often have to live a couple of turn cycles before you have devastated everyone. There is no worse feeling than having your Rakdos exiled with swords to plowshares after you have sacrificed half of your stuff and before you have hit someone. For that purpose, here's a couple of protection Recommendations:
Deflecting Swat: Is an absolutely free way to protect your stuff when your commander is out on the field. No reason not to use if you can afford it.
Bolt Bend: Will generally cost only 1 mana for a similar effect and gets that low cost when protecting most of your high-end creatures, whether or not Rakdos is on the field.
Not of This World: When protecting your commander, this is a free colorless counterspell.
Swiftfoot Boots/Lightning Greaves: Very cheap and long-term protection against targeted removal. It's also a pretty good as a haste provider as it is fairly rare that you'd be pushing out two big demons onto the battlefield in the same turn and you can simply equip this on the card most recently played or reanimated.
2. A Haste Package: Similarly, Rakdos does it's best work when he's able to come down and swings right away. Mass Hysteria has the chance to blow up in your face as mentioned above and anger, while fine, may feel bad if you are putting it into the graveyard instead of using that opportunity to shove a reanimation target there. I've already mentioned the boots and greaves above but another two possible candidates include:
1. Herald of Slaanesh: All of your demons not only gain haste but cost 2 less. This card makes hardcasting and swinging with Rakdos on turn 4 a fairly simple manner.
2. Chainer, Nighmare Adept: This card does a surprising amount. It gives haste to your commander and to reanimated targets, it lets you cast creatures from your graveyard, and it's a discard outlet to boot.
3. An Interaction Package: Doing your own thing is all well and good but you still want to have ways to interact with foes if they get a fast start, get down stax pieces to slow you down, or threaten to combo off. Possible Recommendations include:
1. Deadly Rollick: Free exile removal if your commander is out.
2. Feed the Swarm: One of the few pieces of enchantment removal you have access to.
3. Hagra Mauling + Shatterskull Smashing : Removal that can double as a land is awesome.
4. Chaos Warp: A risky card but it can potentially remove anything.
5. Tibalt's Trickery: A red counterspell as an emergency panic button.
6. Vandalblast: A specialized artifact removal spell.
7. Toxic Deluge + Blasphemous Act: The best mass removal options in these colors, in case someone else is swarming the board.
Mana Production: Just a couple of pieces that may have been missed:
1. Dockside Extortionist: The best piece of red ramp in the game.
2. Jeska's Will: The second-best piece of red ramp in the game.
3. Black Market Connections: One of the best black cards out there. It draws cards, adds mana, creates 3/2 creatures that count as demons. This thing does it all.
4. Bolas's Citadel: While not "mana production" in the traditional sense, this card lets you pay life instead of mana costs and plays very well into the type of strategy that you have been going for.
Recommendations for Rakdos: a few specialized recommendatiosn for this deck:
Thrilling Encore Another way to get back what your opponents have sacrificed other than Tergrid.
Mayhem Devil: A way to turn all of those sacrifices (yours and your opponents) into damage that might sweep the board or knock the few life opponents have left.
Bloodthirster or Balor: Mono-red demons with fairly bit impact that are both designed for multiplayer.
Raphael, Fiendish Savior + Shadowspear: Convenient ways to gain back some of the life you've been paying that aren't named "Gray Merchant".
Liliana's Contract: An outright win condition for any deck with a demon subtheme.
Crucible of Worlds: The only way for you to replay those lands you are doubtless sacrificing to your own Rakdos Triggers.
A sample decklist
2 Dockside Extortionist
2 Dream Devourer
2 Blade of the Oni
3 Herald of Slaanesh
3 Varragoth, Bloodsky Sire
3 Mayhem Devil
4 Chainer, Nightmare Adept
4 Rakdos Lord of Riots
4 Treasonous Ogre
5 Tergrid, God of Fright
5 Balor
5 Raphael, Fiendish Savior
5 Greven, Predator Captain
6 Rakdos the Defiler
6 Rakdos the Showstopper
6 Sower of Discord
6 Rakshasa Debaser
7 Rune-Scarred Demon
8 Archfiend of Despair
8 Archon of Despair
8 Vilis, Broker in Blood
8 Razaketh, the Foulblooded
Instants (13)
1 Malakir Rebirth
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Entomb
2 Tibalt's Trickery
3 Deflecting Swat
3 Chaos Warp
3 Valakut Awakening
4 Bolt Bend
4 Deadly Rollick
4 Hagra Mauling
5 Thrilling Encore
5 Savage Beating
7 Not of This World
1 Vandalblast
1 Faithless Looting
1 Reanimate
2 Demonic Tutor
2 Feed the Swarm
2 Cathartic Reunion
2 Shatterskull Smashing
3 Agadeem's Awakening
3 Toxic Deluge
3 Jeska's Will
3 Wheel of Fortune
3 Wheel of Misfortune
3 Yawgmoth's Will
9 Blasphemous Act
Artifacts (11)
0 Mana Crypt
0 Chrome Mox
1 Sol Ring
1 Shadowspear
2 Arcane Signet
2 Rakdos Signet
2 Talisman of Indulgence
2 Swiftfoot Boots
2 Lightning Greaves
3 Crucible of Worlds
6 Bolas's Citadel
Enchantments (7)
2 Animate Dead
2 Dance of the Dead
2 Underworld Breach
3 Necromancy
3 Black Market Connections
5 Liliana's Contract
6 Fiery Emancipation
1 Ancient Tomb
1 Arid Mesa
1 Badlands
1 Blood Crypt
1 Bloodstained Mire
1 Blightstep Pathway
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Cavern of Souls
1 Command Tower
1 Dragonskull Summit
1 Graven Cairn
1 Haunted Ridge
1 Luxury Suite
1 Marsh Flats
6 Mountain
1 Polluted Delta
1 Prismatic Vista
1 Scalding Tarn
7 Swamp
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Wooded Foothills
The land count may seem low but the deck is packing a bunch of cards that can be played as lands in a pinch.
It costs 80 bucks instead of 45. Prices are up on Amazon.
I am 100% convinced that it will come with 2 phyrexian foil lands of each basic land type and that may be a sufficient draw for some. Maybe the two foil mythic promos will be worth something but I will be a bit surprised if so.
If a source would add more than one mana to a player’s mana pool, that player instead loses life equal to the difference and adds one mana of any color.
The comprehensive rules beg to differ.
If the comprehensive rules included a ruling that ran entirely contrary to logic and language, the comprehensive rules win.
The comprehensive rules literally define the rules of these cards.
If Teferi gets embroiled in things and ends up grabbing a third powerstone piece, I’m going to lose my cool and start laughing like a madman… more than normal, I mean.
Also, I am dubbing the third piece “The Midstone”