Basically, if you want flying for one, why not Spectral Flight or Shimmering Wings or, better yet, Aqueous Form? If you want flying for all, Levitation or Wonder is what you're after. This tries to have it both ways and ends up being unsatisfactory for both.
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Card advantage is not the same thing as card draw. Something for 2B cannot be strictly worse than something for BBB or 3BB. If you're taking out Swords to Plowshares for Plummet, you're a fool. Stop doing these things!
Edit: I just noticed that the crown's sacrifice effect works on all creatures that share a type with the previously-enchanted creature, not just your creatures that share a type. Wow, it's even worse than I thought.
I think this is exactly the card that the people who design precon commanders love.
Undeniably strong card. I've never had it stick in a deck though. I know how good it can be, it just seems a bit too easy to break with storm and such, and that's not something I'm all that interested in.
Card advantage is not the same thing as card draw. Something for 2B cannot be strictly worse than something for BBB or 3BB. If you're taking out Swords to Plowshares for Plummet, you're a fool. Stop doing these things!
My Jaya list has a grand total of 11 instants and sorceries other than this and it's still been good enough to consistently make the cut across 6 years of updates and set releases. All around good card.
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[Pr]Jaya | Estrid | A rotating cast of decks built out of my box.
Dackbuilding challenge: all non-lands are portmanteaus.
is that a portmanteau of deckbuilding and dack fayden?
Seems tough, but at least we now have hypothesizzle.
This is the posterboy for how awkward the planeswalker damage change can be for some cards. Might have been best to just leave it as player-only. Plus now it gets countered if they remove their pw in response, which is a decent-sized functional change. Oh well.
If you're junding it up and have a ton of mana it's decent. Only hitting one player is tough, though. It's been strong in the precons when we've bashed them 1v1 but I don't think it's nearly as powerful as, say, torment of hailfire in multiplayer.
Usually when your X spell outperforms something at certain points - In this case, Flame Wave - it's a pretty good card. They're both insane limited cards. But I've never seen either cast in a commander game, nor have I ever seen anyone Bonfire of the Damned somebody. Cards just have 'target player' syndrome. Mizzium Mortars is another potential alternative that will hit each opponent but not in the face.
*looks at name* Bad Jund! Taking Izzet names. Shame on you!
*looks at art* Normally, I complain that Steve Argyle makes anatomically impossible drawings, but I can confirm that cats do vomit that exact pattern on green rugs.
The biggest problem is, this is a format where creatures with 6 or more toughness (either base toughness or through anthems, +1/+1 counters, or auras/equipment) will certainly be played, and creatures with 7 or more toughness will often be played. Plague Wind/In Garruk's Wake kills those.
Card advantage is not the same thing as card draw. Something for 2B cannot be strictly worse than something for BBB or 3BB. If you're taking out Swords to Plowshares for Plummet, you're a fool. Stop doing these things!
The first choice of the random button was actually Demonic Attorney, a card so obviously offensive they mention in the text that conceding is an option. I don't think many people feel much better than that about Oloro.
Edit: Yo! Who was asking about blue/white giant tribal, cause we got one, baby!
Oloro, Ageless Ascetic
he first choice of the random button was actually Demonic Attorney, a card so obviously offensive they mention in the text that conceding is an option. I don't think many people feel much better than that about Oloro.
Edit: Yo! Who was asking about blue/white giant tribal, cause we got one, baby!
and ante ewww
As for Oloro, I've used him to head a pillowfort/solider token deck and it's easy for the life gain to get out of control quickly not that it matters very much in this format
Has anyone ever played with ante? Its an awful mechanic, not because its gambling but because of the randomness of the bet (seriously guys, any tournament with an entry fee is gambling). Card prices vary wildly, so often your going to hit something janky you could easily replace, and hitting a $300 card while someone else hits a basic is garbage. However, if instead of losing the card, you laid a set amount of money on the line per card ante'd, maybe that could work. You still ante the cards themselves, the randomness of losing a card from your library is sort of neat, and you need to do that in order to make some of the cards work, but you don't lose the ante'd cards, just the pre agreed to bet per card.
On the other hand, ante cards themselves are total bull*****. Contract from Below, Amulet of Quoz. Its either ridiculously OP, nearly useless, or "lol lets flip a coin to win unless you bet more monies."
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The Meaning of Life: "M-hmm. Well, it's nothing very special. Uh, try and be nice to people, avoid eating fat, read a good book every now and then, get some walking in, and try and live together in peace and harmony with people of all creeds and nations"
Onering's 4 simple steps that let you solve any problem with Magic's gameplay
Whether its blue players countering your spells, red players burning you out, or combo, if you have a problem with an aspect of Magic's gameplay, you can fix it!
Step 1: Identify the problem. What aspect of Magic don't you like? Step 2: Find out how others deal with the problem. How do players deal with this aspect of the game when they run into it? Step 3: Do what those players do. Step 4: No more problem. Bonus: You are now better at Magic. Enjoy those extra wins!
Has anyone ever played with ante? Its an awful mechanic, not because its gambling but because of the randomness of the bet (seriously guys, any tournament with an entry fee is gambling). Card prices vary wildly, so often your going to hit something janky you could easily replace, and hitting a $300 card while someone else hits a basic is garbage. However, if instead of losing the card, you laid a set amount of money on the line per card ante'd, maybe that could work. You still ante the cards themselves, the randomness of losing a card from your library is sort of neat, and you need to do that in order to make some of the cards work, but you don't lose the ante'd cards, just the pre agreed to bet per card.
On the other hand, ante cards themselves are total bull*****. Contract from Below, Amulet of Quoz. Its either ridiculously OP, nearly useless, or "lol lets flip a coin to win unless you bet more monies."
Ante is decently fun in a few scenarios.
1. You're still in High School and no one has really expensive cards.
2. You make a cube designed to play with Ante, and play way more rounds than you normally would over the course of several months.
3. You're playing Shandalar. Good times.
I'm sure there's a subsection of players for whom money is no object and they play 93/94 with full ante rules and win P9 from each other regularly, but it doesn't matter to them because they have infinite whatever they want anyway. And they have tophats and twirlable moustaches.
Oloro, Ageless Ascetic gains you life which is good if you want to gain life. I guess. But you start with 40 so why are you gaining life? A lot better if you start with 20 as a homerule, but why are you homeruling to 20 life if you're just gonna whip out Oloro?
Ah, Oloro the bane of my existence. I'm that guy who tracks the life totals, by hand.
Aside from that, can't really say much about him other than he is a classic control commander. Passive lifegain ensures chip damage is meaningless to you. Esper colors means access to an excellent set of options (Tutors, Counterspells, good removal). And in a pinch he does have a card draw stapled onto him (a cheaper version of the new Dawn of Hope from GRN).
Why would anyone care about the third ability? It basically does nothing in this format. The combination of his first two abilities are pretty good - repeatable card draw for a low onging cost is a valuable tool and as such I think he's a decent commander. A bit on the expensive side to cast, and his card draw is generally outclassed by Zur's, but having a card advantage engine in the command zone in the second best 3 colour combination means he's generally going to perform well. But the third ability might as well just be flavour text.
Well, then you get three or four cards when you win. Mostly.
Anyway, ante existed because Richard Garfield mistakenly thought his game would be something to play before everyone got together to play D&D and nothing more. That's actually the same reason color hosers are so strong: If you're playing at least three colors, more likely four or five, something like Conversion doesn't hurt like it does when you're playing monored burn. (And of course, this also applies to hate specific to nonbasic lands.)
It was an interesting time. It is something I can appreciate, even though just considering the logistics, I'm happy Shahrazad will be unbanned inshallah.
Anyway, Oloro's kinda funny because the deck builds itself: Propaganda effects, creatures with lifelink, a few choice permanents with extort, some lifegain as gravy (e.g., Absorb, Sphinx's Revelation), Felidar Sovereign, Test of Endurance, Blood Bond. But there is still a place for customization. I tend to run a lot of evasive lifelink creatures in my Oloro, including, yes, Divinity of Pride. I also run lucky charms for the synergy with Oloro: "Kicker 1, cantrip if kicked" seems pretty strong.
Card advantage is not the same thing as card draw. Something for 2B cannot be strictly worse than something for BBB or 3BB. If you're taking out Swords to Plowshares for Plummet, you're a fool. Stop doing these things!
People hate him out because, while he folds to competitive decks, Oloro pillow fort to nowhere is an annoying casual archetype that many fair decks have trouble with. His 2 life a turn isn't a whole lot on it's own, but it's extra padding for a deck that's already difficult to draw blood from, and there are plenty of cards that trigger off life gain that the 2 life a turn from the zone matters. You're basically announcing that you need to be attacked early because your plan is to become insurmountable in the late game. Stronger metas won't care, weaker ones will see a need to kill threat.
Also, a number of people are seemingly allergic to anything that works from the command zone. Oloro and Derevi got a lot of hate for'breaking the rules' and having an effect from the command zone or being able to dodge commander tax. This has lessened as people got used to it and the tribal commanders with similar effects got released, but even then there were people complaining about it. Regardless of whether it's good or not, some people hate command zone effects like John Wick hates dog killers.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
The Meaning of Life: "M-hmm. Well, it's nothing very special. Uh, try and be nice to people, avoid eating fat, read a good book every now and then, get some walking in, and try and live together in peace and harmony with people of all creeds and nations"
Onering's 4 simple steps that let you solve any problem with Magic's gameplay
Whether its blue players countering your spells, red players burning you out, or combo, if you have a problem with an aspect of Magic's gameplay, you can fix it!
Step 1: Identify the problem. What aspect of Magic don't you like? Step 2: Find out how others deal with the problem. How do players deal with this aspect of the game when they run into it? Step 3: Do what those players do. Step 4: No more problem. Bonus: You are now better at Magic. Enjoy those extra wins!
A sensible person might suggest that if you have the mana to make this powerful, you should probably just win the game. But I know you sadists. You all just want to play this with infinite mana and kill everyone 4 damage at a time over the course of 6 hours.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Zedruu: "This deck is not only able to go crazy - it also needs to do so."
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Dibs on 5-color Wild Pair Titan/Crown deck. I'm personally unbanning Prime Time for myself.
On phasing:
Edit: I just noticed that the crown's sacrifice effect works on all creatures that share a type with the previously-enchanted creature, not just your creatures that share a type. Wow, it's even worse than I thought.
Two Score, Minus Two or: A Stargate Tail
(Image by totallynotabrony)
Green wrath FTW!
(U/B)(U/B)(U/B) JUMP IN THE LINE, ROCK YOUR BODY IN TIME
(R/W)(R/W)(R/W) RISING FROM THE NEON GLOOM, SHINING LIKE A CRAZY MOON
(U/R)(R/G)(G/U) STEALIN' WHEN I SHOULD HAVE BEEN BUYIN'
I think this is exactly the card that the people who design precon commanders love.
Undeniably strong card. I've never had it stick in a deck though. I know how good it can be, it just seems a bit too easy to break with storm and such, and that's not something I'm all that interested in.
On phasing:
Dackbuilding challenge: all non-lands are portmanteaus.
Seems tough, but at least we now have hypothesizzle.
This is the posterboy for how awkward the planeswalker damage change can be for some cards. Might have been best to just leave it as player-only. Plus now it gets countered if they remove their pw in response, which is a decent-sized functional change. Oh well.
If you're junding it up and have a ton of mana it's decent. Only hitting one player is tough, though. It's been strong in the precons when we've bashed them 1v1 but I don't think it's nearly as powerful as, say, torment of hailfire in multiplayer.
EDH Primers
Phelddagrif - Zirilan
EDH
Thrasios+Bruse - Pang - Sasaya - Wydwen - Feather - Rona - Toshiro - Sylvia+Khorvath - Geth - QMarchesa - Firesong - Athreos - Arixmethes - Isperia - Etali - Silas+Sidar - Saskia - Virtus+Gorm - Kynaios - Naban - Aryel - Mizzix - Kazuul - Tymna+Kraum - Sidar+Tymna - Ayli - Gwendlyn - Phelddagrif 4 - Liliana - Kaervek - Phelddagrif 3 - Mairsil - Scarab - Child - Phenax - Shirei - Thada - Depala - Circu - Kytheon - GrenzoHR - Phelddagrif - Reyhan+Kraum - Toshiro - Varolz - Nin - Ojutai - Tasigur - Zedruu - Uril - Edric - Wort - Zurgo - Nahiri - Grenzo - Kozilek - Yisan - Ink-Treader - Yisan - Brago - Sidisi - Toshiro - Alexi - Sygg - Brimaz - Sek'Kuar - Marchesa - Vish Kal - Iroas - Phelddagrif - Ephara - Derevi - Glissa - Wanderer - Saffi - Melek - Xiahou Dun - Lazav - Lin Sivvi - Zirilan - Glissa
PDH - Drake - Graverobber - Izzet GM - Tallowisp - Symbiote Brawl - Feather - Ugin - Jace - Scarab - Angrath - Vraska - Kumena Oathbreaker - Wrenn&6
Dragons of Legend, Lead by Scion of the UR-Dragon
The Gitrog Monster
Gonti, Lord of Luxury
Shogun Saskia
Hive World
Atraxa hates fun
Abzan
*looks at name* Bad Jund! Taking Izzet names. Shame on you!
*looks at art* Normally, I complain that Steve Argyle makes anatomically impossible drawings, but I can confirm that cats do vomit that exact pattern on green rugs.
*looks at casting cost* This reminds me of how I used to complain over how Savage Twister and Simoon could be monored (and now the latter basically is, excluding a few oddball cases like enrage, Saber Ants, Hornet Nest, Pious Warrior, and Stuffy Doll). And now they're adding black? (I mean, to be fair, it is a gold block, and in fact the gold set, but it's not like Violent Ultimatum and friends didn't exist.)
The biggest problem is, this is a format where creatures with 6 or more toughness (either base toughness or through anthems, +1/+1 counters, or auras/equipment) will certainly be played, and creatures with 7 or more toughness will often be played. Plague Wind/In Garruk's Wake kills those.
On phasing:
The first choice of the random button was actually Demonic Attorney, a card so obviously offensive they mention in the text that conceding is an option. I don't think many people feel much better than that about Oloro.
Edit: Yo! Who was asking about blue/white giant tribal, cause we got one, baby!
and ante ewww
As for Oloro, I've used him to head a pillowfort/solider token deck and it's easy for the life gain to get out of control quickly not that it matters very much in this format
On the other hand, ante cards themselves are total bull*****. Contract from Below, Amulet of Quoz. Its either ridiculously OP, nearly useless, or "lol lets flip a coin to win unless you bet more monies."
Onering's 4 simple steps that let you solve any problem with Magic's gameplay
Step 1: Identify the problem. What aspect of Magic don't you like? Step 2: Find out how others deal with the problem. How do players deal with this aspect of the game when they run into it? Step 3: Do what those players do. Step 4: No more problem. Bonus: You are now better at Magic. Enjoy those extra wins!
Ante is decently fun in a few scenarios.
1. You're still in High School and no one has really expensive cards.
2. You make a cube designed to play with Ante, and play way more rounds than you normally would over the course of several months.
3. You're playing Shandalar. Good times.
I'm sure there's a subsection of players for whom money is no object and they play 93/94 with full ante rules and win P9 from each other regularly, but it doesn't matter to them because they have infinite whatever they want anyway. And they have tophats and twirlable moustaches.
Oloro, Ageless Ascetic gains you life which is good if you want to gain life. I guess. But you start with 40 so why are you gaining life? A lot better if you start with 20 as a homerule, but why are you homeruling to 20 life if you're just gonna whip out Oloro?
Aside from that, can't really say much about him other than he is a classic control commander. Passive lifegain ensures chip damage is meaningless to you. Esper colors means access to an excellent set of options (Tutors, Counterspells, good removal). And in a pinch he does have a card draw stapled onto him (a cheaper version of the new Dawn of Hope from GRN).
Also the artwork is a rip-off of Vish Kal, Blood Arbiter.
Well, then you get three or four cards when you win. Mostly.
Anyway, ante existed because Richard Garfield mistakenly thought his game would be something to play before everyone got together to play D&D and nothing more. That's actually the same reason color hosers are so strong: If you're playing at least three colors, more likely four or five, something like Conversion doesn't hurt like it does when you're playing monored burn. (And of course, this also applies to hate specific to nonbasic lands.)
It was an interesting time. It is something I can appreciate, even though just considering the logistics, I'm happy Shahrazad will be unbanned inshallah.
Anyway, Oloro's kinda funny because the deck builds itself: Propaganda effects, creatures with lifelink, a few choice permanents with extort, some lifegain as gravy (e.g., Absorb, Sphinx's Revelation), Felidar Sovereign, Test of Endurance, Blood Bond. But there is still a place for customization. I tend to run a lot of evasive lifelink creatures in my Oloro, including, yes, Divinity of Pride. I also run lucky charms for the synergy with Oloro: "Kicker 1, cantrip if kicked" seems pretty strong.
I don't get the hate. Just play Kavu Predator or Leyline of Punishment or False Cure or something. Or play Rafiq or Saskia infect, come to think of it.
On phasing:
They all be Jarl Balgruffin.'
Also, a number of people are seemingly allergic to anything that works from the command zone. Oloro and Derevi got a lot of hate for'breaking the rules' and having an effect from the command zone or being able to dodge commander tax. This has lessened as people got used to it and the tribal commanders with similar effects got released, but even then there were people complaining about it. Regardless of whether it's good or not, some people hate command zone effects like John Wick hates dog killers.
Onering's 4 simple steps that let you solve any problem with Magic's gameplay
Step 1: Identify the problem. What aspect of Magic don't you like? Step 2: Find out how others deal with the problem. How do players deal with this aspect of the game when they run into it? Step 3: Do what those players do. Step 4: No more problem. Bonus: You are now better at Magic. Enjoy those extra wins!
A sensible person might suggest that if you have the mana to make this powerful, you should probably just win the game. But I know you sadists. You all just want to play this with infinite mana and kill everyone 4 damage at a time over the course of 6 hours.