My dear clan, I believe it is time we revive a tradition here! Let us start getting things planned out for our Winter 2012 CMB tournament!!
Our first issue: What platform should this be played on. I was thinking that since MWS has been slacking as of late, we hit up Cockatrice.
Our second issue: What format. I feel this will get the most discussion.
We have done Standard, EDH, and Bring your own Standard. That said, it was done two years ago. My vote for this current one is either Modern or EDH, but will also hear suggestions for other formats. I probably want to get this thing off the ground by the US Thanksgiving and letting it run until Christmas or later. It will be a swiss format. After a number of rounds dependent on the number of players, we will cut to a top bracket, also dependent on the number of players, with a minimum of a top 4.
As always, all members of all clans will be invited to join, as are mods. I will contact some mods later about it. I know when rianalnn was mod here, he said it would be ok to host the thread here. I will ask the current mods for the same. (I will also mention our intent for 4 tournaments a year - Spring - Summer - Fall - and Winter). Perhaps we will have set formats for it each season as well. (like Legacy Spring, Standard Summer, Modern Fall, EDH winter). We could also throw in things like BYOS, Pauper/Peasant, Extended (hey! I still play!) and other formats as well. But this is something I think we should put on the back burner until after the Winter Tournament.
I'm up for anything honestly! Pauper sounds kind of fun :-p Though I just want to play some inter-clan magic!!! Also I'd need some help with Cockatrice as I don't really know how to use anything except MWS and MTGO :/
4 is a lot, but doable. 3 months per tourney is like 12 rounds at a round a week (which seems reasonable) Then top 4 should take more than a week as it is only 3 matches. 4 does seem like a lot but I think we can accommodate
Also I like cube :-p
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Ready for the apocalypses? The dark side is always open
Our second issue: What format. I feel this will get the most discussion.
We have done Standard, EDH, and Bring your own Standard. That said, it was done two years ago. My vote for this current one is either Modern or EDH, but will also hear suggestions for other formats.
I'd prefer EDH, but then there's the question of how do you do multiplayer tournaments? I wouldn't want to do 1v1 EDH.
If we have to do 1v1, then Modern or a reboot of BYOS.
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"[Screw] you and the green you ramped in on." - My EDH battle cry. If I had one. Which I don't.
I'd prefer EDH, but then there's the question of how do you do multiplayer tournaments? I wouldn't want to do 1v1 EDH.
If we have to do 1v1, then Modern or a reboot of BYOS.
It would have to be 1v1 EDH. We did it a couple years ago and it was fun. therestless actually won that one.
So in other news, any Assassin's Creed fans here? I'm an avid fan of the franchise, and I must say, III has been living up to the hype, especially after I was left a bit disappointed after Revelations.
So in other news, any Assassin's Creed fans here? I'm an avid fan of the franchise, and I must say, III has been living up to the hype, especially after I was left a bit disappointed after Revelations.
I haven't finished Revelations, but yeah, I'm a huge fan of the series. I got kind of burned out because I played right from the first one through to Revelations in a matter of ... three months? I decided to take a break, but haven't gotten back around to it. I'll get III sometime after I finish and it finds its way to the bargain rack.
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"[Screw] you and the green you ramped in on." - My EDH battle cry. If I had one. Which I don't.
I like Assassin's Creed, but I haven't tried the new one, since I have bought a new bass recently, money isn't the thing I got most of. However I will most likely pick the game up when it drops a bit in price.
@CMB-tourny: Well I am really up for any format, I think BYOS could be fun, but I wouldn't really mind anything else either.
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Decks I play:
Legacy:
Pox
Demon Stompy
Black Knights
Modern:
Tainted Shadow
MBC
8 Rack
Casual:
Suicide Black
Old-school Nightmare Effect
EDH:
Anowon, the Ruin Sage
"God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him."
-Friedrich Nietzsche
I've given it some more thought. I'd love to do an EDH Tourney. Failing that, my second choice would be BYOS.
What kind of deckbuilding rules do we use? Is there some sort of "you have to own the cards" restriction? I'm assuming the 1v1 EDH Tourney would follow the French EDH Banlist.
I like Assassin's Creed, but I haven't tried the new one, since I have bought a new bass recently, money isn't the thing I got most of. However I will most likely pick the game up when it drops a bit in price.
Very few games are worth the initial sale value. The only exceptions would be those with an online community you want to join immediately.
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"[Screw] you and the green you ramped in on." - My EDH battle cry. If I had one. Which I don't.
What kind of deckbuilding rules do we use? Is there some sort of "you have to own the cards" restriction? I'm assuming the 1v1 EDH Tourney would follow the French EDH Banlist.
You do not have to own any of the cards. You can build purely for what you think is optimal. Once the event starts, you are locked into your card choices (enforced by deck code).
1v1 EDH tends to go by a slightly modified version of the French list. Last I checked, the only actual difference was Divining Top is legal.
Anyway, am I the only person who prefers MWS? Of course, that's because I'm used to MWS while I wasn't even aware Cockatrice existed until...right now
Dude, I know how you feel. I played on MWS for years. I became aware of Cockatrice as an alternative so I tried it once. Much of the interface and shortcuts are the same, so it was an easy transition. I love the program.
Just give it a try; you'll see what I mean.
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"[Screw] you and the green you ramped in on." - My EDH battle cry. If I had one. Which I don't.
Greetings Clan Mono-Black. I just started playing mtg and I am a BIG fan of the mono decks and black is far and away my favorite. I built a deck that has won me some casual games. It's probably not a great deck - as i said I'm just starting, but I'd love to fulfill the first requirement of joining the clan.
can I just list the deck here?
j
anyway, here it is - again, it's not perfect. I'm still working on getting a few more of some of these cards so I can remove some others.
Greetings Clan Mono-Black. I just started playing mtg and I am a BIG fan of the mono decks and black is far and away my favorite. I built a deck that has won me some casual games. It's probably not a great deck - as i said I'm just starting, but I'd love to fulfill the first requirement of joining the clan.
can I just list the deck here?
j
Welcome to MTGS!
And yes, you can just post the decklist here.
In other news, my LGS forgot to order the Commander Arsenals. So... that's gonna suck.
Greetings Clan Mono-Black. I just started playing mtg and I am a BIG fan of the mono decks and black is far and away my favorite. I built a deck that has won me some casual games. It's probably not a great deck - as i said I'm just starting, but I'd love to fulfill the first requirement of joining the clan.
can I just list the deck here?
j
anyway, here it is - again, it's not perfect. I'm still working on getting a few more of some of these cards so I can remove some others.
Greetings from Clan Mono-Black's esteemed Evincar (you guys have no clue how much I have wanted to say that :p). Our policy for membership is to have a deck of certain quality and while your deck might not be up to the level we'd like it to be, our members will more than certainly help you achieve that level. Until it reaches that level, feel free to post. We are a nice bunch and are easy to get along with. I assume you would like to be added as a friend for now then?
As for your deck, I can already see some potential. I'll tell you this now, it is a hell of a lot better than my first magic deck. I like your start of having 3 Nighthawks ( and I am also a fan of how you know Giant Scorpion should be a Nighthawk. This shows promise.) I cannot say enough how good the Nighthawk is. That said, There is something I must say about your deck. I see its being drawn in two directions. Vamprires vs Zombies. Consider picking one and going with that one, that and flesh the deck out with 4 ofs to make the deck more consistant. If you chose to go with Zombies, I know there is a very good, competitive standard deck for Zombies out there. Perhaps get ideas from there. I'm sure there is a vampire deck floating around in Developing too. Perhaps research those and get some ideas.
Again, you are welcomed to continue posting in Clan Mono-Black!
so on a side note for everyone here, in the realm of my EDH addiction, I have been considering switching Sedris to Nicol Bolas. As you can see from my sig of 850 EDH decks (ok, 18....) the first line is my "shards of Alara" series. Nicol Bolas is Grixisey enough. My only dilemma is that it gives Karrthus too much of an advantage over him....
Greetings from Clan Mono-Black's esteemed Evincar (you guys have no clue how much I have wanted to say that :p). Our policy for membership is to have a deck of certain quality and while your deck might not be up to the level we'd like it to be, our members will more than certainly help you achieve that level. Until it reaches that level, feel free to post. We are a nice bunch and are easy to get along with. I assume you would like to be added as a friend for now then?
As for your deck, I can already see some potential. I'll tell you this now, it is a hell of a lot better than my first magic deck. I like your start of having 3 Nighthawks ( and I am also a fan of how you know Giant Scorpion should be a Nighthawk. This shows promise.) I cannot say enough how good the Nighthawk is. That said, There is something I must say about your deck. I see its being drawn in two directions. Vamprires vs Zombies. Consider picking one and going with that one, that and flesh the deck out with 4 ofs to make the deck more consistant. If you chose to go with Zombies, I know there is a very good, competitive standard deck for Zombies out there. Perhaps get ideas from there. I'm sure there is a vampire deck floating around in Developing too. Perhaps research those and get some ideas.
Again, you are welcomed to continue posting in Clan Mono-Black!
so on a side note for everyone here, in the realm of my EDH addiction, I have been considering switching Sedris to Nicol Bolas. As you can see from my sig of 850 EDH decks (ok, 18....) the first line is my "shards of Alara" series. Nicol Bolas is Grixisey enough. My only dilemma is that it gives Karrthus too much of an advantage over him....
Yes i'd like to be added as a friend to this group. My intention is to get rid of most of the 1of's that i have and replace them with cards to get up to 2of or 4of. I agree with everything that you said and suggested. I need to get out and buy another bunch of boosters. I was ideally going to get up 2 or 4 Geralf's Messengers, 4 Vampire Nighthawk, etc. But now maybe I will take your advice and build a zombie deck and a vampire deck! I thought I had selected a good group of cards that balanced well together, but like I said. I'm totally new to all of this!
Thanks a bunch for the insight.
Should I continue to repost the deck as I make changes?
and is it not kosher to mix decks like i've done (zombie/vampire)?
Yes i'd like to be added as a friend to this group. My intention is to get rid of most of the 1of's that i have and replace them with cards to get up to 2of or 4of. I agree with everything that you said and suggested. I need to get out and buy another bunch of boosters. I was ideally going to get up 2 or 4 Geralf's Messengers, 4 Vampire Nighthawk, etc. But now maybe I will take your advice and build a zombie deck and a vampire deck! I thought I had selected a good group of cards that balanced well together, but like I said. I'm totally new to all of this!
Should I continue to repost the deck as I make changes?
and is it not kosher to mix decks like i've done (zombie/vampire)?
Hail fellow black mage and welcome. Always good to see more sheep flocking to the pit...I mean friends...*shifty eyes*
First off you will hear this every time you post a deck with 1-of's that aren't finishers in a control deck...you need 4. Got that out of the way. Now the arch type I have been playing the most is aggro, which this looks to be, so here we go. Note: this will be standard oriented as most of the cards seem standard.
Tormented soul is best when you have a reason to connect with him. The swords from scars, exalted triggers, any effect that says "when this creature deals combat damage to a player"... in this deck he is just a 1 damage per turn pinger.
With the ability to have 12 turn 1 2/x guys(creatures that have a 2 for power) Walking corpus is a bit lackluster. I would go with these guys:
Crypt keeper should be Tormods Crypt and it should be in the sideboard. If you don't yet know what a sideboard is don't worry it is more for tourneys and something you will learn as you play.
Sangromancer isn't standard so for the purposes of this exercise she is dropped.
Actually one of the best cards in the standard Zombie deck is a vampire. Blood Artist can win games. Night hawk is also another really good card in any deck that can cast it. The problem as I see it is a
dis-synergy(is that a word?) between the cards you run. a vampire deck that runs Vampire Nocturnus is great, but without a critical mass of vampire types it is hard to get alot of good use out of him.
K so my input mixed with a bit of bordom has made this
If your not opposed to running two colors(I know it's mono black clan but shhh!) splash 4 each of Dragonskull Summit and Blood Crypt . Then you can run dreadbore and flashback on bump in the night as well as a bit of various burn (direct damage red spells). You came at a bit of a hazy time in standard for mono colors. Ravnica is all about dual colored guilds. blacks current guilds are rakdos as black/red and golgari as black/green.
Anyway welcome to the clan and I'm sure in no time you will be welcomed as a full member.
Hail fellow black mage and welcome. Always good to see more sheep flocking to the pit...I mean friends...*shifty eyes*
First off you will hear this every time you post a deck with 1-of's that aren't finishers in a control deck...you need 4. Got that out of the way. Now the arch type I have been playing the most is aggro, which this looks to be, so here we go. Note: this will be standard oriented as most of the cards seem standard.
Tormented soul is best when you have a reason to connect with him. The swords from scars, exalted triggers, any effect that says "when this creature deals combat damage to a player"... in this deck he is just a 1 damage per turn pinger.
With the ability to have 12 turn 1 2/x guys(creatures that have a 2 for power) Walking corpus is a bit lackluster. I would go with these guys:
Crypt keeper should be Tormods Crypt and it should be in the sideboard. If you don't yet know what a sideboard is don't worry it is more for tourneys and something you will learn as you play.
Sangromancer isn't standard so for the purposes of this exercise she is dropped.
Actually one of the best cards in the standard Zombie deck is a vampire. Blood Artist can win games. Night hawk is also another really good card in any deck that can cast it. The problem as I see it is a
dis-synergy(is that a word?) between the cards you run. a vampire deck that runs Vampire Nocturnus is great, but without a critical mass of vampire types it is hard to get alot of good use out of him.
K so my input mixed with a bit of bordom has made this
If your not opposed to running two colors(I know it's mono black clan but shhh!) splash 4 each of Dragonskull Summit and Blood Crypt . Then you can run dreadbore and flashback on bump in the night as well as a bit of various burn (direct damage red spells). You came at a bit of a hazy time in standard for mono colors. Ravnica is all about dual colored guilds. blacks current guilds are rakdos as black/red and golgari as black/green.
Anyway welcome to the clan and I'm sure in no time you will be welcomed as a full member.
Thanks. this was extremely helpful. My actual intention (need the cards to do this) is to bring - 4x Vampire Nighthawk and 4x Geralf's Messenger to get rid of alot of those 1of's I have. Now I'm starting to lean more to building a Vampire Deck and a separate Zombie deck.
Could get expensive! I tried to add cards that would benefit both zombies and vampires in the same deck (army of the dead, etc and Vampire Nocturnus)
what does it mean that Sangromancer isn't standard? Sorry, I'm new at all of this.
I really like the thought of bringing Rakdos Crackler. And I've been told repeatedly to get Blood Artist in there!
Greetings from Clan Mono-Black's esteemed Evincar (you guys have no clue how much I have wanted to say that :p).
Well you've declared yourself to be the Evincar more than once. I'm not what happened during your absence from the Evincar title entitles the adjective "esteemed" though. I would have thought "feared" or "run screaming from" Evincar would have been a more fitting description for your royal highass highness.
Remember, fear will keep the disciples in line. Fear of my ridiculous streams of thought :p:rolleyes:
Greetings Clan Mono-Black. I just started playing mtg and I am a BIG fan of the mono decks and black is far and away my favorite. I built a deck that has won me some casual games. It's probably not a great deck - as i said I'm just starting, but I'd love to fulfill the first requirement of joining the clan.
Hello to the newcomer. Also, if you are worried about the overall price, you could consider investing in singles. Also, do you want your deck to be standard legal or do you just want a casual deck with no particular format in mind? Because if it is casual, there is a lot of great vampires in the Zendikar block and there is a lot of nice zombies in the Odyssey block.
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Decks I play:
Legacy:
Pox
Demon Stompy
Black Knights
Modern:
Tainted Shadow
MBC
8 Rack
Casual:
Suicide Black
Old-school Nightmare Effect
EDH:
Anowon, the Ruin Sage
"God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him."
-Friedrich Nietzsche
what does it mean that Sangromancer isn't standard? Sorry, I'm new at all of this.
I really like the thought of bringing Rakdos Crackler. And I've been told repeatedly to get Blood Artist in there!
Ok the main formats are as follows:
Standard
standard is a rotating format. This means that every few years the legal cards of the format change. It is made up of the past two blocks and the current core set. Currently that includes
Innistrad Block= Innistrad(the set), Dark Ascension, and Avacyn Restored
The Current Core Set is called M13
And we just started the Ravnica Block with the set Return to Ravnica.
next year we will start a new set and the entire innistrad set will become illegal for use in standard. Sangromancer is from the set Mirroden Besieged in the scars of mirrodin block which rotated last month.
Modern
Modern is a non rotating format(cards only become illegal when they are banned by wizards of the coast). The cards that are legal in it is anything from 8th edition forward.
Legacy
Legacy is a non rotating format just as Modern but all cards are legal except banned cards. It is different from Vintage because they ban cards in an attempt to not have extremely broken stuff in the format to make it a bit more fair. If you ever see a vintage tournament you will know what I mean by "fair". Vintage is extremely broken as alot of decks can win by turn 1-2.
Vintage Not really something you have to worry about unless you have $4000 to drop on a deck right now. The costs are crazy but it is basically legacy without a strict banlist. A few of the cards that would normally be banned are restricted to 1 per deck.
Thanks. this was extremely helpful. My actual intention (need the cards to do this) is to bring - 4x Vampire Nighthawk and 4x Geralf's Messenger to get rid of alot of those 1of's I have. Now I'm starting to lean more to building a Vampire Deck and a separate Zombie deck.
Could get expensive! I tried to add cards that would benefit both zombies and vampires in the same deck (army of the dead, etc and Vampire Nocturnus)
The first and most important part of deck building is to have a focus for the deck. army of the damned is good if you are playing something that stalls out waiting for a big win. Since you are making an aggro deck you want to win fast. So even though army of the damned says zombie tokens and has synergy with a "zombie deck" it is pointless in an aggro zombie deck because you want to win before you get to 8 mana, you would never be able to cast it. This is the same reason I said Mikeaus was bad is because you will rarely get to 6 to cast him. In my current deck I'm lucky to get to 4-5 every game, i play standard zombies. I win before i even draw the lands. Aggro wants to play cheap efficient creatures. So playing Zombies and Vampires together is fine cause you want them for what they can do not so much what their creature types are. the only thing that needs the zombie type is gravecrawler.
Also less on a deckbuilding side and more on a not emptying your wallet point of view if you know what you want to make it is always cheaper to order singles offline or wind a game store near you that runs tourneys. Game stores generally sell singles and the people that play their generally have cards to trade.
Standard
standard is a rotating format. This means that every few years the legal cards of the format change. It is made up of the past two blocks and the current core set. Currently that includes
Innistrad Block= Innistrad(the set), Dark Ascension, and Avacyn Restored
The Current Core Set is called M13
And we just started the Ravnica Block with the set Return to Ravnica.
next year we will start a new set and the entire innistrad set will become illegal for use in standard. Sangromancer is from the set Mirroden Besieged in the scars of mirrodin block which rotated last month.
Modern
Modern is a non rotating format(cards only become illegal when they are banned by wizards of the coast). The cards that are legal in it is anything from 8th edition forward.
Legacy
Legacy is a non rotating format just as Modern but all cards are legal except banned cards. It is different from Vintage because they ban cards in an attempt to not have extremely broken stuff in the format to make it a bit more fair. If you ever see a vintage tournament you will know what I mean by "fair". Vintage is extremely broken as alot of decks can win by turn 1-2.
Vintage Not really something you have to worry about unless you have $4000 to drop on a deck right now. The costs are crazy but it is basically legacy without a strict banlist. A few of the cards that would normally be banned are restricted to 1 per deck.
Thanks for all this. If I ever get to a point where I'm doing tournaments, I guess I'd be playing in Modern Events because I kinda want to get a great couple of decks together and stick with them. At least that's how I feel now. It will probably change as new expansion come out down the road. Are there always Modern games at these tournaments or is it dominated by Standard events?
Standard is the most commonly played tournament format by a huge margin. Modern and Legacy events are not generally a regularly occurring thing.
Modern and Legacy are both great formats, but the cost barrier for entry into them (i.e. getting a good deck) can be prohibitive. To alleviate this, Wizards is working on the release of the Modern Masters reprint set which is explicitly designed to lower the cost of Modern.
@ therestless: out of curiosity do you own any power? sort of along the lines of why your cube isn't powered
Well, I do have this. Currently in my Rasputin deck.
It's the only piece of power I care to own because it's the only one that's legal in EDH.
The cube will not be powered because I don't think I'd like playing with a powered cube. Same reason I'm not including the (much more accessible) fast mana like Sol Ring, Mana Crypt, and Mana Vault. They polarize the game state too much (i.e. lead to blowouts within the first few turns of the game) and make for extremely obvious first picks which cheapens the draft portion of cubing. Wouldn't mind a second Timetwister though, as it's not nearly on the level of the rest. Hell, at this point Power 9 should probably just be -Timetwister +Library of Alexandria.
Four events in a year will actually be pretty significant considering how long they can take.
Also, made myself a cube thread! (http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=459931)
I'm up for anything honestly! Pauper sounds kind of fun :-p Though I just want to play some inter-clan magic!!! Also I'd need some help with Cockatrice as I don't really know how to use anything except MWS and MTGO :/
4 is a lot, but doable. 3 months per tourney is like 12 rounds at a round a week (which seems reasonable) Then top 4 should take more than a week as it is only 3 matches. 4 does seem like a lot but I think we can accommodate
Also I like cube :-p
Ready for the apocalypses? The dark side is always open
I much prefer Cockatrice, and I even paid for MWS a few years back. Cockatrice is solid.
I'd prefer EDH, but then there's the question of how do you do multiplayer tournaments? I wouldn't want to do 1v1 EDH.
If we have to do 1v1, then Modern or a reboot of BYOS.
Pristaxcontrombmodruu!
It would have to be 1v1 EDH. We did it a couple years ago and it was fun. therestless actually won that one.
So in other news, any Assassin's Creed fans here? I'm an avid fan of the franchise, and I must say, III has been living up to the hype, especially after I was left a bit disappointed after Revelations.
I guess I could do that. Wouldn't be mono black, but I could.
I haven't finished Revelations, but yeah, I'm a huge fan of the series. I got kind of burned out because I played right from the first one through to Revelations in a matter of ... three months? I decided to take a break, but haven't gotten back around to it. I'll get III sometime after I finish and it finds its way to the bargain rack.
Pristaxcontrombmodruu!
@CMB-tourny: Well I am really up for any format, I think BYOS could be fun, but I wouldn't really mind anything else either.
Decks I play:
-Friedrich Nietzsche
What kind of deckbuilding rules do we use? Is there some sort of "you have to own the cards" restriction? I'm assuming the 1v1 EDH Tourney would follow the French EDH Banlist.
Very few games are worth the initial sale value. The only exceptions would be those with an online community you want to join immediately.
Pristaxcontrombmodruu!
You do not have to own any of the cards. You can build purely for what you think is optimal. Once the event starts, you are locked into your card choices (enforced by deck code).
1v1 EDH tends to go by a slightly modified version of the French list. Last I checked, the only actual difference was Divining Top is legal.
All the more reason not to do EDH again
Just kidding I would be down for EDH or BYOS; I have some ideas kicking around...
Anyway, am I the only person who prefers MWS? Of course, that's because I'm used to MWS while I wasn't even aware Cockatrice existed until...right now
Dude, I know how you feel. I played on MWS for years. I became aware of Cockatrice as an alternative so I tried it once. Much of the interface and shortcuts are the same, so it was an easy transition. I love the program.
Just give it a try; you'll see what I mean.
Pristaxcontrombmodruu!
can I just list the deck here?
j
anyway, here it is - again, it's not perfect. I'm still working on getting a few more of some of these cards so I can remove some others.
2x Walking Corpse
4x Highborn Ghoul
1x Crypt Creeper (for lack of another Walking Corpse or Tormented Soul)
3x Vampire Nighthawk
1x Geralf's Messenger
1x Chosen of Markov (for lack of either Geralf's Messenger, Vampire Nighthawk, or Walking Corpse)
1x Giant Scorpion (only because I don't have another Vampire Nighthawk)
1x Liliana's Shade
1x Sangromancer
1x Liliana of the Dark Realm
2x Farbog Boneflinger
2x Vengeful Vampire
1x Vampire Nocturnus
1x Mikaeus, the Unhallowed
2x Spiteful Shadows
4x Murder
2x Reap the Seagraf
1x Sorin's Thirst
1x Mark of the Vampire
1x Endless Ranks of the Dead
1x Army of the Damned
Welcome to MTGS!
And yes, you can just post the decklist here.
In other news, my LGS forgot to order the Commander Arsenals. So... that's gonna suck.
Greetings from Clan Mono-Black's esteemed Evincar (you guys have no clue how much I have wanted to say that :p). Our policy for membership is to have a deck of certain quality and while your deck might not be up to the level we'd like it to be, our members will more than certainly help you achieve that level. Until it reaches that level, feel free to post. We are a nice bunch and are easy to get along with. I assume you would like to be added as a friend for now then?
As for your deck, I can already see some potential. I'll tell you this now, it is a hell of a lot better than my first magic deck. I like your start of having 3 Nighthawks ( and I am also a fan of how you know Giant Scorpion should be a Nighthawk. This shows promise.) I cannot say enough how good the Nighthawk is. That said, There is something I must say about your deck. I see its being drawn in two directions. Vamprires vs Zombies. Consider picking one and going with that one, that and flesh the deck out with 4 ofs to make the deck more consistant. If you chose to go with Zombies, I know there is a very good, competitive standard deck for Zombies out there. Perhaps get ideas from there. I'm sure there is a vampire deck floating around in Developing too. Perhaps research those and get some ideas.
Again, you are welcomed to continue posting in Clan Mono-Black!
so on a side note for everyone here, in the realm of my EDH addiction, I have been considering switching Sedris to Nicol Bolas. As you can see from my sig of 850 EDH decks (ok, 18....) the first line is my "shards of Alara" series. Nicol Bolas is Grixisey enough. My only dilemma is that it gives Karrthus too much of an advantage over him....
Yes i'd like to be added as a friend to this group. My intention is to get rid of most of the 1of's that i have and replace them with cards to get up to 2of or 4of. I agree with everything that you said and suggested. I need to get out and buy another bunch of boosters. I was ideally going to get up 2 or 4 Geralf's Messengers, 4 Vampire Nighthawk, etc. But now maybe I will take your advice and build a zombie deck and a vampire deck! I thought I had selected a good group of cards that balanced well together, but like I said. I'm totally new to all of this!
Thanks a bunch for the insight.
Should I continue to repost the deck as I make changes?
and is it not kosher to mix decks like i've done (zombie/vampire)?
thanks again
jason
Hail fellow black mage and welcome. Always good to see more sheep flocking to the pit...I mean friends...*shifty eyes*
First off you will hear this every time you post a deck with 1-of's that aren't finishers in a control deck...you need 4. Got that out of the way. Now the arch type I have been playing the most is aggro, which this looks to be, so here we go. Note: this will be standard oriented as most of the cards seem standard.
Mikeaus is too high on the curve(costs too much to cast). The same can be said of Vengeful vampire, Farbog boneflinger, and lilianas shade(passable but probably not up to snuff).
Tormented soul is best when you have a reason to connect with him. The swords from scars, exalted triggers, any effect that says "when this creature deals combat damage to a player"... in this deck he is just a 1 damage per turn pinger.
With the ability to have 12 turn 1 2/x guys(creatures that have a 2 for power) Walking corpus is a bit lackluster. I would go with these guys:
Crypt keeper should be Tormods Crypt and it should be in the sideboard. If you don't yet know what a sideboard is don't worry it is more for tourneys and something you will learn as you play.
Sangromancer isn't standard so for the purposes of this exercise she is dropped.
Actually one of the best cards in the standard Zombie deck is a vampire. Blood Artist can win games. Night hawk is also another really good card in any deck that can cast it. The problem as I see it is a
dis-synergy(is that a word?) between the cards you run. a vampire deck that runs Vampire Nocturnus is great, but without a critical mass of vampire types it is hard to get alot of good use out of him.
K so my input mixed with a bit of bordom has made this
4x Rakdos Crackler
4x Gravecrawler
4x Diregraf Ghoul
2x Blood Artist
1x Bloodthrone Vampire
3x Knight of Infamy
4x Geralfs Messenger
4x Vampire Nighthawk
4x Crippling blight
1x Murder
4x Bump in the night
3x Tragic Slip
22x Swamp
If your not opposed to running two colors(I know it's mono black clan but shhh!) splash 4 each of Dragonskull Summit and Blood Crypt . Then you can run dreadbore and flashback on bump in the night as well as a bit of various burn (direct damage red spells). You came at a bit of a hazy time in standard for mono colors. Ravnica is all about dual colored guilds. blacks current guilds are rakdos as black/red and golgari as black/green.
Anyway welcome to the clan and I'm sure in no time you will be welcomed as a full member.
Thanks. this was extremely helpful. My actual intention (need the cards to do this) is to bring - 4x Vampire Nighthawk and 4x Geralf's Messenger to get rid of alot of those 1of's I have. Now I'm starting to lean more to building a Vampire Deck and a separate Zombie deck.
Could get expensive! I tried to add cards that would benefit both zombies and vampires in the same deck (army of the dead, etc and Vampire Nocturnus)
what does it mean that Sangromancer isn't standard? Sorry, I'm new at all of this.
I really like the thought of bringing Rakdos Crackler. And I've been told repeatedly to get Blood Artist in there!
Well you've declared yourself to be the Evincar more than once. I'm not what happened during your absence from the Evincar title entitles the adjective "esteemed" though. I would have thought "feared" or "run screaming from" Evincar would have been a more fitting description for your royal
highasshighness.Remember, fear will keep the disciples in line. Fear of my ridiculous streams of thought :p:rolleyes:
Hi stabwound! I'm crazy!...and you are?
Decks I play:
-Friedrich Nietzsche
Ok the main formats are as follows:
Standard
standard is a rotating format. This means that every few years the legal cards of the format change. It is made up of the past two blocks and the current core set. Currently that includes
Innistrad Block= Innistrad(the set), Dark Ascension, and Avacyn Restored
The Current Core Set is called M13
And we just started the Ravnica Block with the set Return to Ravnica.
next year we will start a new set and the entire innistrad set will become illegal for use in standard. Sangromancer is from the set Mirroden Besieged in the scars of mirrodin block which rotated last month.
Modern
Modern is a non rotating format(cards only become illegal when they are banned by wizards of the coast). The cards that are legal in it is anything from 8th edition forward.
Legacy
Legacy is a non rotating format just as Modern but all cards are legal except banned cards. It is different from Vintage because they ban cards in an attempt to not have extremely broken stuff in the format to make it a bit more fair. If you ever see a vintage tournament you will know what I mean by "fair". Vintage is extremely broken as alot of decks can win by turn 1-2.
Vintage Not really something you have to worry about unless you have $4000 to drop on a deck right now. The costs are crazy but it is basically legacy without a strict banlist. A few of the cards that would normally be banned are restricted to 1 per deck.
For more on the sets:
http://www.wizards.com/Magic/TCG/Article.aspx?x=mtg/tcg/products/allproducts
And a more indepth look at formats:
http://www.wizards.com/Magic/TCG/Resources.aspx?x=mtg/tcg/resources/formats-sanctioned
The first and most important part of deck building is to have a focus for the deck. army of the damned is good if you are playing something that stalls out waiting for a big win. Since you are making an aggro deck you want to win fast. So even though army of the damned says zombie tokens and has synergy with a "zombie deck" it is pointless in an aggro zombie deck because you want to win before you get to 8 mana, you would never be able to cast it. This is the same reason I said Mikeaus was bad is because you will rarely get to 6 to cast him. In my current deck I'm lucky to get to 4-5 every game, i play standard zombies. I win before i even draw the lands. Aggro wants to play cheap efficient creatures. So playing Zombies and Vampires together is fine cause you want them for what they can do not so much what their creature types are. the only thing that needs the zombie type is gravecrawler.
Also less on a deckbuilding side and more on a not emptying your wallet point of view if you know what you want to make it is always cheaper to order singles offline or wind a game store near you that runs tourneys. Game stores generally sell singles and the people that play their generally have cards to trade.
Thanks for all this. If I ever get to a point where I'm doing tournaments, I guess I'd be playing in Modern Events because I kinda want to get a great couple of decks together and stick with them. At least that's how I feel now. It will probably change as new expansion come out down the road. Are there always Modern games at these tournaments or is it dominated by Standard events?
Modern and Legacy are both great formats, but the cost barrier for entry into them (i.e. getting a good deck) can be prohibitive. To alleviate this, Wizards is working on the release of the Modern Masters reprint set which is explicitly designed to lower the cost of Modern.
j
Ready for the apocalypses? The dark side is always open
Well, I do have this. Currently in my Rasputin deck.
It's the only piece of power I care to own because it's the only one that's legal in EDH.
The cube will not be powered because I don't think I'd like playing with a powered cube. Same reason I'm not including the (much more accessible) fast mana like Sol Ring, Mana Crypt, and Mana Vault. They polarize the game state too much (i.e. lead to blowouts within the first few turns of the game) and make for extremely obvious first picks which cheapens the draft portion of cubing. Wouldn't mind a second Timetwister though, as it's not nearly on the level of the rest. Hell, at this point Power 9 should probably just be -Timetwister +Library of Alexandria.