Blocking has been horrendous for the past few blocks. I personally miss high toughness creatures stopping attackers and positively contributing to your tempo rather than just getting blown out all the time.
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That was pretty interesting. But dropping a warship on me is cheating. Take it back!
Do I miss the days where a 2/4 stonewalled the opponent's entire board for multiple turns? Not really. The current state of blocking is a duel of creature, trick, and removal trades, which is more interesting than two players staring at each other from behind a wall of fat and deathtouch.
i actually do like formats where you could stonewal your opponent /if/ you drew right and drew your defensive spells at the right time. that is, if you get lucky, you get to shut off the creature duels. i loved this strategy in M12, which didn't work very often given how aggro M12 was, but M12 also didn't have many "grow P/T very high" mechanics or pump effects, such that a x/5 actually /would/ block most common creatures and almost definitely survive.
in other words, i do like the option of stonewalling as a /possibility/, instead of the default of "it's about creatures that duel" being the "always" state.
[however, having said that, wasn't 3xkhans often a boardstall format? or am i misremembering]
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Goblins have poor impulse control. Don't click this link!!
some of my favourite flavour text:
Wayward Soul "no home no heart no hope"
—Stronghold graffito
Raging Goblin He raged at the world, at his family, at his life. But mostly he just raged.
I don't think the days of Glacial Wall need to come back, but I'd sure love to have a chance at trading my creatures off against an aggressive opponent so I can get to the long game (assuming my deck is designed to do so or is favored in going deep into turns). But nope, more Freighters, Crashers, Gust Walkers that my dinky 1/3 "control" 2-drop or 2/3 Prowess jankdude don't stand a chance in hell against.
The combat step in Magic is supposed to be full of choices, mindgames, and interaction, but the past few sets of Limited have felt utterly brainless oftentimes with how ineffectual blocking can feel.
I don't want to completely brick wall someone, but I do want my defensive 3 mana creatures to not be completely invalidated by someone's two mana aggressive creatures. Taking the offensive is a fundamentally better strategy than reacting to your opponent, so I don't think punishing people for playing defensively is good for the game.
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That was pretty interesting. But dropping a warship on me is cheating. Take it back!
Can a few exert creatures and bombs get through those blockers? Yes. But you can also run removal and tricks to deal with their few evasive creatures, then use your walls to stop the others. Sometimes "stop" just means that with two 2/4s you can profitably double block a 5/4 to trade up 1-for-1.
Sure, you can have a board in which you simply have the magical +1 toughness that does the trick to stop the opponent army of 2/2 sized creatures from attacking.
BUT that is so unlikely to happen.
The exert creatures become 4/1 first strike, 3/3 flyers, 5/4 Menace, blocking them is always a terrible spot to be in.
In lots of these cases the attacker doesnt even need a trick, they get such a bonus that blocking is utterly pointless and plenty of cards further make blocking either impossible (tappers, removal, "cant block", etc.) that it simply isnt a real option, outside of a desperate try to crawl back bleeding from getting beaten to death.
The blockers are overall terrible filler cards and they just dont really work in the set, as they are too small and vanilla (being vanilla isnt really helping them).
Giant Spider delivers simply for the fact it has reach and you sometimes simply need such a blocker against a lot of flyers, thats ok, but its still miles worse than simply playing removal or hitting them harder for more damage.
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The vigilance creatures here are mostly 1/1 tokens, which are bad at attacking, but jump block at least. Never really satisfying, but its what it is.
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Soulstinger is one of the few good blocker creatures, but it can do much more and delivers on almost any front (becomes even an 4/5 attacker if you wish).
Attacking into it just to lose 2 creatures is terrible, thats the kind of card that truly prevents small aggro decks from attacking.
All the mechanics in Amonkhet and Hour favor attacking, if something dies it will come back bigger with eternalize and tricks that untap allow you to attack and block with a surprise bonus (which is satisfying if it works).
There is room for slower strategies, but they happen much less often and building a competitive deck in limited that can stand to survive the beatdown is much harder to archive.
Its not like you would not block at all, but just being the guy that has to block is the more terrible situation to be in, as this set favors attackers so much more (you only attack if you dont get blown out by blockers to begin with, and if they are tapped out, you are not really going to attack that hurts you).
The "flash" creatures do not punish players enough, as they are too small and trading against an attacker is absolutely not enough.
a 3/4 sized flash creature would totally do the trick, but sadly they put "cycling" on a lot of those and not flash.
Black/Blues best bet to stay alive is the life link from the black Cartouche , especially with the -1/-1 counter hopefully killing another creature, that card alone piggy backs the color combination to have some hope to win against heavy aggressive decks.
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The vanilla creatures are truly trash filler cards.
I do miss blocking. The lack of incentive to block as a rule makes limited control builds difficult. I am a control player at heart and early defencive creatures are key to a limited control deck. Blocking is how limited control survives till the late game where it has the advantage. Given all the recent combat keywords favor the attacker, blocking effectively or even trading is much, much less common. And lets be honest anything with a toughness less than 4 is useless as a blocker as many, many 2 drops now swing for 3. This hurts control, doubly so because because in Hour of devastation and Amonkhet there is only 4 common/uncommon creatures that have a toughness of 4 or greater for that same two mana. If 2 drops can attack for 3 turn 3 that just is not enough.
The lack of blocking did make amonket a little one note, but I found that HOU now allows for blocking making the games a bit more interactive and interesting. Blocking is still risky with aflict and such but makes the decission interesting but at least blocking is possible because the threats are not evasive anymore (Gust walker and that 3/1 that get's extra power and first strike are not as frequent) and the answers are a bit better.
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Pauper: Burn
Modern: Burn
Legacy: Burn
EDH: Marath, Will of the Wild - Ramp/Combo | Anafenza the Foremost - French | Uril, the Miststalker - Voltron | Freyalise, Llanowar's Fury - Goodstuff
Ghost Council of Orzhov - Tokens | Lazav, Dimir Mastermind - Control | Isamaru, Hound of Konda - Tiny Leaders
in other words, i do like the option of stonewalling as a /possibility/, instead of the default of "it's about creatures that duel" being the "always" state.
[however, having said that, wasn't 3xkhans often a boardstall format? or am i misremembering]
Goblins have poor impulse control. Don't click this link!!
some of my favourite flavour text:
Wayward Soul
"no home no heart no hope"
—Stronghold graffito
Raging Goblin
He raged at the world, at his family, at his life. But mostly he just raged.
The combat step in Magic is supposed to be full of choices, mindgames, and interaction, but the past few sets of Limited have felt utterly brainless oftentimes with how ineffectual blocking can feel.
But I also love RDW, where blocking is for chumps.
Can a few exert creatures and bombs get through those blockers? Yes. But you can also run removal and tricks to deal with their few evasive creatures, then use your walls to stop the others. Sometimes "stop" just means that with two 2/4s you can profitably double block a 5/4 to trade up 1-for-1.
Some of the best blockers are not walls but the cheap 2-for-1 creatures: Sacred Cat, Labyrinth Guardian, Trueheart Duelist, Unwavering Initiate, Doomed Dissenter. Opponent can waste Exert or a trick to blow through your blocker and survive, but that costs him tempo and you get a 2nd blocker for him to deal with. Tokens also help you survive to the lategame, especially build-around token engines like Nest of Scarabs, Oketra the True, Oketra's Monument, Hapatra, and Drake Haven.
Sure, you can have a board in which you simply have the magical +1 toughness that does the trick to stop the opponent army of 2/2 sized creatures from attacking.
BUT that is so unlikely to happen.
The exert creatures become 4/1 first strike, 3/3 flyers, 5/4 Menace, blocking them is always a terrible spot to be in.
In lots of these cases the attacker doesnt even need a trick, they get such a bonus that blocking is utterly pointless and plenty of cards further make blocking either impossible (tappers, removal, "cant block", etc.) that it simply isnt a real option, outside of a desperate try to crawl back bleeding from getting beaten to death.
The blockers are overall terrible filler cards and they just dont really work in the set, as they are too small and vanilla (being vanilla isnt really helping them).
Giant Spider delivers simply for the fact it has reach and you sometimes simply need such a blocker against a lot of flyers, thats ok, but its still miles worse than simply playing removal or hitting them harder for more damage.
----
The vigilance creatures here are mostly 1/1 tokens, which are bad at attacking, but jump block at least. Never really satisfying, but its what it is.
----
Soulstinger is one of the few good blocker creatures, but it can do much more and delivers on almost any front (becomes even an 4/5 attacker if you wish).
Attacking into it just to lose 2 creatures is terrible, thats the kind of card that truly prevents small aggro decks from attacking.
All the mechanics in Amonkhet and Hour favor attacking, if something dies it will come back bigger with eternalize and tricks that untap allow you to attack and block with a surprise bonus (which is satisfying if it works).
There is room for slower strategies, but they happen much less often and building a competitive deck in limited that can stand to survive the beatdown is much harder to archive.
Its not like you would not block at all, but just being the guy that has to block is the more terrible situation to be in, as this set favors attackers so much more (you only attack if you dont get blown out by blockers to begin with, and if they are tapped out, you are not really going to attack that hurts you).
The "flash" creatures do not punish players enough, as they are too small and trading against an attacker is absolutely not enough.
a 3/4 sized flash creature would totally do the trick, but sadly they put "cycling" on a lot of those and not flash.
Black/Blues best bet to stay alive is the life link from the black Cartouche , especially with the -1/-1 counter hopefully killing another creature, that card alone piggy backs the color combination to have some hope to win against heavy aggressive decks.
----
The vanilla creatures are truly trash filler cards.
You play them if you must, but thats all.
WUBRG#BlackLotusMatterWUBRG
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