The problem is the shuffler is true random and doesn't mirror mana weaving in paper magic.
That needs flipped around. The problem is that people don't properly shuffle in paper magic.
If I could, I'd do a Fischer-Yates (aka Knuth) shuffle in paper every time I need to shuffle, but it takes too long with real cards, and to do it right you need something that can give you a number from 1 to N where N is the cards left in your deck (which I would solve by writing a phone app to generate the number, probably using an online source of actually random bits, if it didn't take too long to begin with).
My board was empty except for land, which I had roughly one metric ton of, and I had a single Whipflare in hand.
My opponent had hit me for a ton, but not quite enough to kill me, and passed. I untapped, ripped a Slagstorm, unconsciously verbalized "This is going to be sweet", then used my two cards to deal five to all his creatures, and when my Inferno Titan came back into play, I targeted the Frost Titan for one and Elesh Norn for two, paying the two mana to prevent his Titan from countering the ability. Empty board, pass the turn.
He untapped, drew, played a Sun Titan, got rid of my Inferno Titan (I think by bringing back the Fiend Hunter w/ the Titan, but I don't remember exactly). I untapped, drew, looked at the blank in my hand and scooped.
It was still a pretty sweet play, and since it came to mind this morning, I figured I'd start a thread to see what *other* sweet plays people have made that just weren't quite enough to get there.
I've been seeing some things on the net that indicate there was a ruling that you have to announce Cavern Of Souls if you want to use the uncounterable ability.
What exactly does that mean? If I keep doing as I have been doing, and say 'Tap cavern for X', where X is a color, is that sufficient, or do I have to explicitly declare 'This is uncounterable' when I put the creature on the stack?
For instance, at my FNM last Friday, when I'd cast a Titan using Cavern (with Giant named), I'd say 'Tap Cavern for green, forest for green', (or '... for red' in the case of an Inferno Titan), then tap four more lands and put the titan on the stack. That seems to me that it would be completely unambiguous (six mana has been tapped, I declared I was tapping cavern for a color, and that mana was used to cast the creature, it's impossible for it to have been cast in that case *without* it being uncounterable), and I just want to make sure I'm not wrong here.
Wandering Wolf is a complete stud, green has several quality ways to boost a creatures power in this set including Timberland Guide. There are so many creature in this set with 2 or less power that even +1/+1 can make this guy unblockable.
The first time I drafted the set was last night, I ended up with a R/G deck running 19 creatures and four spells, including two Wandering Wolf and two Druid's Familiar.
The wolf ended up being sweet, he got in as a 4/3 unblockable a *lot*, I ended up 3-0 in matches and 6-1 in games. I felt like my deck wasn't that great when I built it, but I think the opens in my pod weren't that great, either.
Edit: Oh, I also had a Scalding Devil. He seemed fine, I only drew and played him once so I don't know if he's amazing or anything like that, but I would have had to either find a different way to deal two or wait a turn (giving my opponent a chance to do something) to win if he'd not been on the board.
In that limited circumstance, it is resolves, there will be a one mana answer that is beneficial to the opponent is my argument.
If they have a one mana answer they are going down a card and you are trading 1-for-1. Which may be good or bad or just 'not quite as good as them taking the 4' for you depending on what else is going on (although, on turn one, there is admittedly probably not a lot going on).
I figure I'm in the 'test it' camp, and/or 'build a deck in which taking a removal card out of their hand or dealing four damage on turn one is right in line with your plan' and test that and see if that deck is any good.
If it is a creature, it is because the opponent wanted it to be a creature, which means it is irrelevant, and playing irrelevant spells is bad.
Strictly speaking, if it is a creature, it is because the opponent thought you having a creature was not as bad for him as taking four damage. That is not the same thing as a creature being irrelevant. It would all depend on the board state. Maybe taking the 4 puts them in burn range and not taking it gives them an extra draw for the out they need to not lose, if you happen have the cards to burn them out - better to not take the four, definitely, but in that situation the 4/3 is not necessarily irrelevant.
I'm not sure what I think of this card yet but I do think that framing it as 'If they pick this, it means this is irrelevant' is just as unjustifiable as 'it's always 4 damage!'.
a) Does the Warden of the Wall untap? (What happens if a spell or ability target becomes illegal midway through resolution? I think it's only checked before it starts resolving but I'm not sure)
b) Is there anything in the rules that would prevent Warden of the Wall from returning to player A's control when the turn ends?
This might be selection or confirmation bias on your part. I know at least one guy who is prone to draft cards like Knowledge Pool just for the giggle factor. I've also played at a larger tournament, done terribly, and noted that the lower brackets were a lot less serious/way more "fun" (which is, I think, a matter of, nobody was worried about making it in anymore - people still played to win but there was tons of banter and jokes being cracked, etc).
Even if someone buys a whole legacy deck at once at current prices, it's a matter of what they value. If they value having a legacy deck more than other things they could buy with the same amount of money ... As long as they're not letting their kids go hungry or something ... why not?
- PlayerA does something - PlayerB calls a judge and explains he isnt sure his opponents' play is right. Judge should respond with asking if he tried communicate with PlayerA about the rightness of the play - through which PlayerB might have become convinced the play actually is right and thus wouldnt have needed to call the judge. If playerB says he didnt try communicate with playerA that is a fault in itself. But if he communicated and still needed judge-confirmation then both A and B would have to give the same explanation of what A said in order for the judge to tell that none of them straighout lies. The judges' personal (unpronounced) verdict on how needed this judge-call really was falls into the category of forming an opinion if he thinks the play OR the judge-call seemed suspicious.
Why should judge calls be suspicious? Why should players spend time trying to talk it out when they disagree?
I've played in one larger tournament, at which I made exactly one judge call - and the nicest thing about that judge call was that I didn't have to worry about trying to convince my opponent, whether or not the judge ruled in a way that benefited me.
I mulled to three in a legacy game on the draw against a deck that had the capability of playing turn 1 show and tell -> Emrakul (via Simian Spirit Guides) ... and won.
I mulled to three because I kept getting hands that couldn't stop *anything* (all land, no land, or no counters). I kept Force of Will, Counterspell, and Flooded Strand. The game was basically all forced plays on my part and I just ripped, ripped, ripped exactly what I needed right when I needed it. For instance, spell snare was dead, but I didn't have anything else to side in, so I kept I think two of them in the deck, just to pitch to force. He went land, go turn 1 ... turn two I ripped a spell snare ... his turn two I had to counter, so I pitched the snare to force, untapped, and ripped a second blue source for the counterspell. The whole game went like that, just royal flush lucky, I consider it my 'epic lucksack win'.
Would have been nice if it were one week earlier. Would have avoided him winning the invitational, and the question of whether or not the suspension was due to all the uproar, or if it would have happened anyway.
If you don't trust the DCI to be a fair ruling body, then you don't sign up. If you don't trust them to be a fair ruling body NOW, why would you bother signing up?
Because fair ruling bodies have never become corrupt, amiright? It is a bad idea to put yourself in a position where someone gets to say 'You give me $5000, you get nothing' and you are legally bound to it.
It is also a bad idea to give an enforcement body direct monetary incentive to make a particular call one way or the other. See current U.S. forfeiture law, where there have been incidents of particular police departments performing raids and/or stopping and seizing vehicles etc. because they get to keep the cash or sell of the assets and money goes in to fund the departments.
Even if he did "forget" it doesnt matter the word cheat does not require intent.
In the context of the rules of the game and the tournament rules, it does. All of the infractions under 'cheating' explicitly state 'intentionally' except for 6.4 Cheating - Manipulation of Game Materials.
"If any individual is deemed to be cheating, as determined by the result of a DCI instigation, that player may face legal action to recoup any prizes won as a result of that cheating, as well as face a punitive fine of $5,000."
People sure as heck would think twice about cheating the first couple time the DCI hit cheaters where it matters, i.e. their pocketbook.
You realize that clause is effectively "You must pay the DCI $5000 whenever the DCI wants", don't you? Nobody should ever enter into an agreement like that, even if they (currently) trust the DCI to only trigger it when the DCI actually thinks someone is cheating. There's too much potential for abuse.
That needs flipped around. The problem is that people don't properly shuffle in paper magic.
If I could, I'd do a Fischer-Yates (aka Knuth) shuffle in paper every time I need to shuffle, but it takes too long with real cards, and to do it right you need something that can give you a number from 1 to N where N is the cards left in your deck (which I would solve by writing a phone app to generate the number, probably using an online source of actually random bits, if it didn't take too long to begin with).
My board was empty except for land, which I had roughly one metric ton of, and I had a single Whipflare in hand.
My opponent had hit me for a ton, but not quite enough to kill me, and passed. I untapped, ripped a Slagstorm, unconsciously verbalized "This is going to be sweet", then used my two cards to deal five to all his creatures, and when my Inferno Titan came back into play, I targeted the Frost Titan for one and Elesh Norn for two, paying the two mana to prevent his Titan from countering the ability. Empty board, pass the turn.
He untapped, drew, played a Sun Titan, got rid of my Inferno Titan (I think by bringing back the Fiend Hunter w/ the Titan, but I don't remember exactly). I untapped, drew, looked at the blank in my hand and scooped.
It was still a pretty sweet play, and since it came to mind this morning, I figured I'd start a thread to see what *other* sweet plays people have made that just weren't quite enough to get there.
What exactly does that mean? If I keep doing as I have been doing, and say 'Tap cavern for X', where X is a color, is that sufficient, or do I have to explicitly declare 'This is uncounterable' when I put the creature on the stack?
For instance, at my FNM last Friday, when I'd cast a Titan using Cavern (with Giant named), I'd say 'Tap Cavern for green, forest for green', (or '... for red' in the case of an Inferno Titan), then tap four more lands and put the titan on the stack. That seems to me that it would be completely unambiguous (six mana has been tapped, I declared I was tapping cavern for a color, and that mana was used to cast the creature, it's impossible for it to have been cast in that case *without* it being uncounterable), and I just want to make sure I'm not wrong here.
The first time I drafted the set was last night, I ended up with a R/G deck running 19 creatures and four spells, including two Wandering Wolf and two Druid's Familiar.
The wolf ended up being sweet, he got in as a 4/3 unblockable a *lot*, I ended up 3-0 in matches and 6-1 in games. I felt like my deck wasn't that great when I built it, but I think the opens in my pod weren't that great, either.
Edit: Oh, I also had a Scalding Devil. He seemed fine, I only drew and played him once so I don't know if he's amazing or anything like that, but I would have had to either find a different way to deal two or wait a turn (giving my opponent a chance to do something) to win if he'd not been on the board.
If they have a one mana answer they are going down a card and you are trading 1-for-1. Which may be good or bad or just 'not quite as good as them taking the 4' for you depending on what else is going on (although, on turn one, there is admittedly probably not a lot going on).
I figure I'm in the 'test it' camp, and/or 'build a deck in which taking a removal card out of their hand or dealing four damage on turn one is right in line with your plan' and test that and see if that deck is any good.
Strictly speaking, if it is a creature, it is because the opponent thought you having a creature was not as bad for him as taking four damage. That is not the same thing as a creature being irrelevant. It would all depend on the board state. Maybe taking the 4 puts them in burn range and not taking it gives them an extra draw for the out they need to not lose, if you happen have the cards to burn them out - better to not take the four, definitely, but in that situation the 4/3 is not necessarily irrelevant.
I'm not sure what I think of this card yet but I do think that framing it as 'If they pick this, it means this is irrelevant' is just as unjustifiable as 'it's always 4 damage!'.
Two questions here:
a) Does the Warden of the Wall untap? (What happens if a spell or ability target becomes illegal midway through resolution? I think it's only checked before it starts resolving but I'm not sure)
b) Is there anything in the rules that would prevent Warden of the Wall from returning to player A's control when the turn ends?
Why should judge calls be suspicious? Why should players spend time trying to talk it out when they disagree?
I've played in one larger tournament, at which I made exactly one judge call - and the nicest thing about that judge call was that I didn't have to worry about trying to convince my opponent, whether or not the judge ruled in a way that benefited me.
I mulled to three because I kept getting hands that couldn't stop *anything* (all land, no land, or no counters). I kept Force of Will, Counterspell, and Flooded Strand. The game was basically all forced plays on my part and I just ripped, ripped, ripped exactly what I needed right when I needed it. For instance, spell snare was dead, but I didn't have anything else to side in, so I kept I think two of them in the deck, just to pitch to force. He went land, go turn 1 ... turn two I ripped a spell snare ... his turn two I had to counter, so I pitched the snare to force, untapped, and ripped a second blue source for the counterspell. The whole game went like that, just royal flush lucky, I consider it my 'epic lucksack win'.
Because fair ruling bodies have never become corrupt, amiright? It is a bad idea to put yourself in a position where someone gets to say 'You give me $5000, you get nothing' and you are legally bound to it.
It is also a bad idea to give an enforcement body direct monetary incentive to make a particular call one way or the other. See current U.S. forfeiture law, where there have been incidents of particular police departments performing raids and/or stopping and seizing vehicles etc. because they get to keep the cash or sell of the assets and money goes in to fund the departments.
In the context of the rules of the game and the tournament rules, it does. All of the infractions under 'cheating' explicitly state 'intentionally' except for 6.4 Cheating - Manipulation of Game Materials.
You realize that clause is effectively "You must pay the DCI $5000 whenever the DCI wants", don't you? Nobody should ever enter into an agreement like that, even if they (currently) trust the DCI to only trigger it when the DCI actually thinks someone is cheating. There's too much potential for abuse.