Just max prestiged this pile of a game the other night. Lag and core gameplay issues made it a chore last two prestiges. I really stopped having fun with it.
Anyway, putting it down with a career 2.15 KDR playing primarily Domination and rushing, always rushing. I can live with that.
Unban Nacatl, Bitterblossom, and Stoneforge and let the chips fall where they may in Modern. That format has been a snorefest from the get go because of all the initial and follow up bannings. People like playing powerful cards - let them play powerful cards. Are Blossom and Mystic format warping? Yes, but they warp it in a more feasible direction than the current boredom of Jund v. Jund mirrors and random Delver decks. Blossom and Mystic don't make Jund or Delver any worse or better. We've seen in Legacy that Delver and Mystic don't really go together - you're either playing Delver or you're playing Stoneblade - two different decks. Blossom makes Fae a deck again, but is that really so terrible? I don't see Faeries dominating the format. A tier one deck with some tuning, sure, but not oppressive.
Jace probably needs to stay banned forever, but as for the cards listed, just let 'em play.
I don't know what people expect out of these Charms. They're two mana uncommon instants with three modes in a format with Snapcaster Mage. Obviously they're not going to do anything overtly powerful. Azorius Charm worked in early decks BECAUSE of Snapcaster; Selesnya has been a product of metagaming.
Stop setting your expectations so high.
Dimir Charm is just okay. I don't think it's Rakdos bad and it will likely see some play because people like playing UB. Countering sorceries is more relevant than people think and the nerfed Smother mode will be situationally good. The fateseal mill thing will likely really drag the card down from being a top spell in standard, but we'll see.
New Gideon is total crap. We've already seen how bad Vraska can be by having a plus ability that has ZERO effect on the board. Gideon's plus is even worse. Why would you want to spend four mana on a card that literally does nothing? If you have two to three creatures on board you're likely already ahead, so why play him? If you're behind, how does he help get you back into a game? Your opponent just ignores him until he gets big enough to warrant removal or a chump block. Terrible, terrible card.
Not to mention, even if he does survive a turn and you don't fall drastically behind because you just spent a turn doing nothing, he turns into a big dumb beater without any form of evasion.
I don't see how anyone can think this card will have any effect whatsoever on any format anywhere. He's Chandra Ablaze level bad. What a disappointment.
I don't know what people were expecting with this. The Hobbit comes from an almost entirely different world than LotR. LotR is fairly dark and monolithic, visually, where the Hobbit has all your classic fantasy tropes.
LotR wasn't even Tolkien's ideal fantasy universe, where everything had gone to hell and people paid dire consequences. The Hobbit is the most accurate representation of the kind of fantasy Tolkien cherished and wanted to share with the world. The only reason LotR even exists is because Tolkien was pressured to write a sequel by his publishing house, so he responded with (what he thought) was a dark, negative critique on war culture and industrialization as a sort of "screw you."
People forget that LotR had characters like Tom Bombadil and scenes like the Merry/Eowyn/Witch-King fight - stuff so comical or outright absurd it seems right out of, hm, a fantasy novel.
I'm not defending the movie or saying Peter Jackson deserves more credit. I think that, more than anything else, The Hobbit is coming at a really bad time in fantasy fiction when everyone is tuned into an ultra-serious, dark realism due to Game of Thrones and other things like it. There's not a lot of people for The Hobbit to charm in a post-recession world. And that's a shame. But if you're going to nitpick The Hobbit, you best bring your chisel because everything bad that can be said about Jackson's Hobbit can be pointed at the LotR films, as well.
I think they go really big with a Boros colored Gideon. No Helix, as that's already been put on Ajani.
Gideon, Herald of Boros 3WWR
Planeswalker - Gideon
+1: Until the beginning of your next upkeep, target creature cannot attack or block and its activated abilities cannot be activated.
-3: At the end of your first combat step this turn, untap all creatures you control, and there is an additional combat step.
-7: You get an emblem with "Damage dealt to your opponents or creatures they control is doubled, rounded up. Damage dealt to you or creatures you control is reduced by half, rounded down."
Just wanted to chime in on drafting a pool of generals.
As Theogony has pointed out, we feel that drafting a general pool is very important. Having to rely on the right general showing up in a pack to lynchpin your deck is fairly risky. Our cube is very small and very tight for an EDH cube. We play with small pools (72 cards draft, 144 cards sealed) and small decks (66 + 1 general). You need to have some kind of gameplan going into a draft. I just see too many situations in which an individual has tried to draft a certain deck/color scheme only to completely miss out on a specific general. Maybe that situation is mitigated by playing with such a huge cube, but I don't see how it can work with ours.
The idea of drafting a general pool (4 generals each in a full 8 man draft, 8 generals each in a 4 man draft) is supposed to engender diversity and versatility when going into the main draft. I almost always draft a pool of generals that covers the color pie, just in case. There have been times I was heavily pushing a Damia deck, for example, over the first two or three packs, only to find I'm getting cut on blue and I need to audible to Karador.dec. When you have multiple generals with different color identities, you're granted versatility right off the bat.
Our drafts are very fluid but also very pointed. We play with good players, so guys go into the draft aiming at a specific strategy or synergy of cards/general. If that doesn't seem to be panning out, they'll audible quickly and effectively. It happens all the time.
I don't know if there's a universal right or wrong here, but conducting the "general draft" has only helped our EDH cube experience. And like Theogony pointed out, if you find a legendary creature in the regular draft, you're more than welcome to play it as a general. The general draft is simply there to ensure everyone gets a powerful tool to build around.
Also, I'd hate to be forced into picking a general in the regular draft at the expense of a power card.
Well there was also a Pheldagrif with an equipped Sword of Feast and Famine in there somewhere too. Honestly the game was so quick, none of us were even mad. We all kind of just looked at each other wondering if anyone had any shenanigans they might pull off. I had an Arcanis and an Archon of Justice that I got off Wild Richochet'ing the first Tooth and Nail. We'd seen Jin Gitaxias in the last game, so it was the best I could think of knowing he was coming to the party. And not even that helped since he Time Stopped on my upkeep. I figured appropriate removal was soon to follow with the draw 7 each turn, either that or a board so overwhelming it really only had to glance my way to take me out of the game. lol
Yeah, it's actually a lot of fun to watch someone lock the game up so quickly with an inevitable win shortly after. It becomes much less fun when someone locks the game up and then has to grind out the win.
@Wildfire: Cleansing looks really interesting. LC what do you think?
I definitely like it, but I'm not sure it fits white. It seems much more of a red flavored card.
I'll have to think about it. Triple white makes it fairly cost restrictive, as well.
Just wanted to mention one of the craziest board locks I've seen in this cube that happened last night.
Pheldagrif player had a pretty insane sequence of plays last night:
Turn 1: Crack a fetch for Tundra, play Enlightened Tutor end of turn searching for Mana Crypt.
Turn 2: Land, Mana Crypt, Skyshroud Claim for Savannah and Tropical Island
Turn 3: Land, Mirari's Wake
Turn 4: Land, end of turn Jin Gitaxias on proceeding opponent's end step, Jin Gitaxias was Chaos Warped (revealing a land).
Turn 5: Alchemist's Refuge, Tooth and Nail for Seedborn Muse and Eternal Witness, returning Tooth and Nail to hand
- first opponent's end step, Harvester of Souls
- second opponent's end step, Tooth and Nail for Jin Gitaxias and Glen Elendra Archmage
- third opponent's end step, Ertai, Wizard Adept
At that point the game was virtually locked up, as the Pheldagrif player had ripped all opponent's hands, forcing them to play off the top of their deck, but locking out whatever they drew with Ertai, Wizard Adept, which untapped during every untap step due to Seedborn Muse.
Crazy powerful and fast as hell. This cube can be amazing.
As someone who has played a 360 card powered paper cube for years, I can safely say that moxen and other fast mana make aggro almost unplayable in this kind of format. It's hard to beat midrange or control strategies when they can freely ramp into bigger and better spells when you're trying to add pressure in the early game (turns 1-3).
Also, Mind Twist is the most rage inducing Magic card ever printed. I've seen more cards thrown over a Mind Twist blowout than any other card in Magic. It's hilarious.
Human nature is oppressive and ignorant and abusive. If you believe in evolution and the animal/instinctive nature of man, then you must see this.
Human's are usually only oppressive to what they believe is wrong or to what they think will harm them. Calling them such because they tend to act against what qualms them is misleading. Similarly, I don't think it's fair to say people in general are abusive based on the most atrocious acts of the most atrocious people.
Man, as an animal, is driven to insure his survival. Perhaps "man is abusive by nature" was the wrong way to put it. If abuse or oppression fits man's need to survive, he will act in such behaviors. Abusing and oppressing others is simply a means to a superior quality of living for those acting in said behaviors. A superior quality of living equates to a superior chance of survival. Thus, man abuses and oppresses.
It is analogous to chimpanzees warring with rival tribes over food sources. So perhaps man isn't naturally abusive, but far too often abuse befits man's survival. That was my point.
As I've discussed before Theogony and I have always tried to maintain a cutting edge general pool, in which each general is attractive, powerful, and relevant. Any general deemed useful "only for its colors" is bad news bears, as far as we're concerned. With that said, most of these generals fit that bill. They were either not being played (Grimgrin, Dralnu), too narrow to be useful (Kaalia, Zur), or just plain not good enough considering other options (Michiko). Zur in particular was an experiment we tried a while back. Zur decks certainly popped up and were buildable, but we quickly discovered that shoehorning Zur targets into a WUB deck made the deck, in fact, way worse. Zur's exclusion prompted a look at some of the targets we shoved into the regular pool, as well as some other tweaks and experiments.
We're excited with Elesh Norn being the new mono white general. She's an obscenely powerful card. We now feel that each mono color general really brings a lot to the table and is attractive for their color.
Quick note on Prison. Ghostly Prison effects are simply something I believe aren't phenomenal in these big multiplayer games. These kind of effects only really start to have a taxing effect if played in multiple copies, which is hard to do here.
More good stuff, more theft, moar blue being blue. Theogony is particularly excited about Counterlash and Ertai. Venser and Willbender were just two creature we didn't feel brought enough to the table.
We're moving away from the slow, incremental CA stuff in black and moving back into griefer. This cube has become about insane play after insane play. We're hoping griefer curbs this a bit.
Another round of experimental stuff in red. Red remains the worst color in the cube and Theogony is very resistant to putting mass land destruction into red full force to increase its power level. Without that, red is a little lost as a primary color. We're hoping to find a good degree of reach within the color to make it more attractive.
Just a couple neat additions to colorless. Karn is a very popular card in EDH so we felt he would be nice here. We also don't have any kind of a Platinum Angel effect, so we thought we'd add that, as well. Scroll Rack hasn't performed particularly well, so we thought we could cut it.
We'll keep the thread updated. We're really going to hammer a lot of games out with a big crowd on Wednesday, so we'll let everyone know how things go.
Anyway, putting it down with a career 2.15 KDR playing primarily Domination and rushing, always rushing. I can live with that.
Jace probably needs to stay banned forever, but as for the cards listed, just let 'em play.
Stop setting your expectations so high.
Dimir Charm is just okay. I don't think it's Rakdos bad and it will likely see some play because people like playing UB. Countering sorceries is more relevant than people think and the nerfed Smother mode will be situationally good. The fateseal mill thing will likely really drag the card down from being a top spell in standard, but we'll see.
Not to mention, even if he does survive a turn and you don't fall drastically behind because you just spent a turn doing nothing, he turns into a big dumb beater without any form of evasion.
I don't see how anyone can think this card will have any effect whatsoever on any format anywhere. He's Chandra Ablaze level bad. What a disappointment.
LotR wasn't even Tolkien's ideal fantasy universe, where everything had gone to hell and people paid dire consequences. The Hobbit is the most accurate representation of the kind of fantasy Tolkien cherished and wanted to share with the world. The only reason LotR even exists is because Tolkien was pressured to write a sequel by his publishing house, so he responded with (what he thought) was a dark, negative critique on war culture and industrialization as a sort of "screw you."
People forget that LotR had characters like Tom Bombadil and scenes like the Merry/Eowyn/Witch-King fight - stuff so comical or outright absurd it seems right out of, hm, a fantasy novel.
I'm not defending the movie or saying Peter Jackson deserves more credit. I think that, more than anything else, The Hobbit is coming at a really bad time in fantasy fiction when everyone is tuned into an ultra-serious, dark realism due to Game of Thrones and other things like it. There's not a lot of people for The Hobbit to charm in a post-recession world. And that's a shame. But if you're going to nitpick The Hobbit, you best bring your chisel because everything bad that can be said about Jackson's Hobbit can be pointed at the LotR films, as well.
Gideon, Herald of Boros 3WWR
Planeswalker - Gideon
+1: Until the beginning of your next upkeep, target creature cannot attack or block and its activated abilities cannot be activated.
-3: At the end of your first combat step this turn, untap all creatures you control, and there is an additional combat step.
-7: You get an emblem with "Damage dealt to your opponents or creatures they control is doubled, rounded up. Damage dealt to you or creatures you control is reduced by half, rounded down."
5
As Theogony has pointed out, we feel that drafting a general pool is very important. Having to rely on the right general showing up in a pack to lynchpin your deck is fairly risky. Our cube is very small and very tight for an EDH cube. We play with small pools (72 cards draft, 144 cards sealed) and small decks (66 + 1 general). You need to have some kind of gameplan going into a draft. I just see too many situations in which an individual has tried to draft a certain deck/color scheme only to completely miss out on a specific general. Maybe that situation is mitigated by playing with such a huge cube, but I don't see how it can work with ours.
The idea of drafting a general pool (4 generals each in a full 8 man draft, 8 generals each in a 4 man draft) is supposed to engender diversity and versatility when going into the main draft. I almost always draft a pool of generals that covers the color pie, just in case. There have been times I was heavily pushing a Damia deck, for example, over the first two or three packs, only to find I'm getting cut on blue and I need to audible to Karador.dec. When you have multiple generals with different color identities, you're granted versatility right off the bat.
Our drafts are very fluid but also very pointed. We play with good players, so guys go into the draft aiming at a specific strategy or synergy of cards/general. If that doesn't seem to be panning out, they'll audible quickly and effectively. It happens all the time.
I don't know if there's a universal right or wrong here, but conducting the "general draft" has only helped our EDH cube experience. And like Theogony pointed out, if you find a legendary creature in the regular draft, you're more than welcome to play it as a general. The general draft is simply there to ensure everyone gets a powerful tool to build around.
Also, I'd hate to be forced into picking a general in the regular draft at the expense of a power card.
I definitely like it, but I'm not sure it fits white. It seems much more of a red flavored card.
I'll have to think about it. Triple white makes it fairly cost restrictive, as well.
Pheldagrif player had a pretty insane sequence of plays last night:
Turn 1: Crack a fetch for Tundra, play Enlightened Tutor end of turn searching for Mana Crypt.
Turn 2: Land, Mana Crypt, Skyshroud Claim for Savannah and Tropical Island
Turn 3: Land, Mirari's Wake
Turn 4: Land, end of turn Jin Gitaxias on proceeding opponent's end step, Jin Gitaxias was Chaos Warped (revealing a land).
Turn 5: Alchemist's Refuge, Tooth and Nail for Seedborn Muse and Eternal Witness, returning Tooth and Nail to hand
- first opponent's end step, Harvester of Souls
- second opponent's end step, Tooth and Nail for Jin Gitaxias and Glen Elendra Archmage
- third opponent's end step, Ertai, Wizard Adept
At that point the game was virtually locked up, as the Pheldagrif player had ripped all opponent's hands, forcing them to play off the top of their deck, but locking out whatever they drew with Ertai, Wizard Adept, which untapped during every untap step due to Seedborn Muse.
Crazy powerful and fast as hell. This cube can be amazing.
Also, Mind Twist is the most rage inducing Magic card ever printed. I've seen more cards thrown over a Mind Twist blowout than any other card in Magic. It's hilarious.
Man, as an animal, is driven to insure his survival. Perhaps "man is abusive by nature" was the wrong way to put it. If abuse or oppression fits man's need to survive, he will act in such behaviors. Abusing and oppressing others is simply a means to a superior quality of living for those acting in said behaviors. A superior quality of living equates to a superior chance of survival. Thus, man abuses and oppresses.
It is analogous to chimpanzees warring with rival tribes over food sources. So perhaps man isn't naturally abusive, but far too often abuse befits man's survival. That was my point.
Update changes are reflected in the original update post.
Generals
OUT
IN
As I've discussed before Theogony and I have always tried to maintain a cutting edge general pool, in which each general is attractive, powerful, and relevant. Any general deemed useful "only for its colors" is bad news bears, as far as we're concerned. With that said, most of these generals fit that bill. They were either not being played (Grimgrin, Dralnu), too narrow to be useful (Kaalia, Zur), or just plain not good enough considering other options (Michiko). Zur in particular was an experiment we tried a while back. Zur decks certainly popped up and were buildable, but we quickly discovered that shoehorning Zur targets into a WUB deck made the deck, in fact, way worse. Zur's exclusion prompted a look at some of the targets we shoved into the regular pool, as well as some other tweaks and experiments.
We're excited with Elesh Norn being the new mono white general. She's an obscenely powerful card. We now feel that each mono color general really brings a lot to the table and is attractive for their color.
White
Ghostly Prison -> Twilight Shepherd
Solitary Confinement -> Karmic Justice
Windborn Muse -> Blazing Archon
Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite -> Phyrexian Rebirth
Quick note on Prison. Ghostly Prison effects are simply something I believe aren't phenomenal in these big multiplayer games. These kind of effects only really start to have a taxing effect if played in multiple copies, which is hard to do here.
Blue
Propaganda -> Proteus Staff
Diplomatic Immunity -> Ertai, Wizard Adept
Willbender -> Counterlash
More good stuff, more theft, moar blue being blue. Theogony is particularly excited about Counterlash and Ertai. Venser and Willbender were just two creature we didn't feel brought enough to the table.
Black
Graveborn Muse -> Cabal Coffers
Syphon Mind -> Anowon, the Ruin Sage
Praetor's Grasp -> Magus of the Abyss
We're moving away from the slow, incremental CA stuff in black and moving back into griefer. This cube has become about insane play after insane play. We're hoping griefer curbs this a bit.
Red
Squee, Goblin Nabob -> World at War
Mogg Infestation -> Confusion in the Ranks
Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle -> Mass Mutiny
Kazuul, Tyrant of the Cliffs -> Acidic Soil
Hoarding Dragon -> Mizzium Mortars
Another round of experimental stuff in red. Red remains the worst color in the cube and Theogony is very resistant to putting mass land destruction into red full force to increase its power level. Without that, red is a little lost as a primary color. We're hoping to find a good degree of reach within the color to make it more attractive.
Green
Perilous Forays -> Awakening Zone
We've wanted Zone in the cube for a while. Forays was the best cut.
Multicolor
No changes
Colorless
Scroll Rack -> Karn, Silver Golem
Everflowing Chalice -> Platinum Angel
Just a couple neat additions to colorless. Karn is a very popular card in EDH so we felt he would be nice here. We also don't have any kind of a Platinum Angel effect, so we thought we'd add that, as well. Scroll Rack hasn't performed particularly well, so we thought we could cut it.
We'll keep the thread updated. We're really going to hammer a lot of games out with a big crowd on Wednesday, so we'll let everyone know how things go.