MTG Salvation

How to turn a goblin token into insanity.

Quote from 5colors »

Quote from hyalopterouslemur »

I don't usually think Core Sets have flavor. M19 did because it was just before Bolas's finale. And Origins did. But mostly Core Sets don't.

Maro in regardes to coresets;
https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/making-magic/metamorphosis-2-0-2017-06-12

The set will have some story relevance, but more in a "filling in information of the past about relevant characters" way than telling a piece of the "present-day" story.

So, basically, more like retcon. Not necessarily bad, but you're more likely to notice when it's bad than when it's good. Sounds alright. Looks like we're getting Chandra, then, but who else?

It's good recursion. Just remember, it goes to the hand, because 1B for a reanimator spell with that effect would be insane.

I don't usually think Core Sets have flavor. M19 did because it was just before Bolas's finale. And Origins did. But mostly Core Sets don't.

Quote from 3drinks »

Holding excess cards without playing them is inefficient resource adjudication. This is a "resource" that is not actually doing anything to help you win. No, just drawing thirty doesn't win on it's own unless you found your combo...in which case you don't need the Tower because you just won. Unless you have an arbitrarily large amount of mana, you're not casting them in one turn either. And if you did have this mana, why didn't you just win (blue sun zenith)?

Its win-more. Simple, common greed. Casual, n00b bait at it's finest.

Well, since the card is a land, the first question is, is it worth trading in a basic land? It might be, if you're in 0-2 colors, maybe even 3 colors if you don't have that many cards costing three mana of one color (or two mana each of two separate colors), but above that? Not so much. (And yes, you should use at least some basic lands even in five-color decks.)

The second question is much more complicated. Is it worth playing just on its own merits, not as something extra you sometimes get? I would say control decks are probably the only time it is. No other deck archetype depends on holding cards in your hand. It's irrelevant for aggro or combo, and it actively works against you if you're playing something like reanimator or dredge

Quote from darkeshrine »

I pronounce Brion Stoutarm as "bree-on" and everyone else I know calls him Brian.

Brion's a somewhat archaic spelling of Brian, you know. Though I think the only time I see it today is in the DCU. Prince Brion Markov.

Huatli is actually an interesting one. The H should be silent, since a lot of Nahuatl orthography is borrowed from Spanish. But the L is not our L. You see, in Nahuatl, the tl is an affricate. IPA: tɬ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9YhH8m3BFY

(While Lakota doesn't have this particular phoneme, a lot of Indian languages do. Cherokee, Navajo, Tlingit...)

The quintessential problem with this card is, dredge, Buried Alive, Gifts Ungiven, Mulch, and Hermit Druid all come off as better ways to self-mill (and very few decks want to self-mill without some black or green), when I'm milling others it's usually Bloodchief Ascension shenanigans, Mesmeric Orb and Mindcrank exist, and as a dig card, even something as bottom-of-the-barrel as Index looks better. 2/10

Quote from tstorm823 »

A rare removal spell that takes 2 creatures off the table and still looks this bad is an impressive feat.

Well, it's not card advantage (unless you play it against a token) and while I like the "superhero Sophie's choice" feel of it (For those not familiar, supervillains have a habit of abducting two people close to the hero, and setting it up so the hero can only save one.) I feel that giving opponents choices on a spell (rather than a triggered ability) is not what I want to do at four mana.

Funny thing is, this isn't the only underwhelming "two for one" removal in Invasion block. Death Mutation and Dead Ringers both exist, after all. Desolation Angel and Desolation Giant look like crap in the era of blink spells.

I play it sometimes, but much more rarely than I used to. Mostly in control decks.

Sounds like I'd rather use it in my own spells than my opponent's but okay.

Primeval (banned) > Sun > Grave > Inferno > Frost

Banning Primeval basically meant I was taking posts and trons out of my decks if they used any colored mana. Beyond that, getting any utility land or any land in all your colors is always good, even if it ETB tapped. Or just any big mana land. And you get two? So, yeah, Primeval has to be at the top.

Sun is pretty easy to understand. Recurring any permanent type, so long as its CMC < 3. So, at a bare minimum, this means things like Strip Mine and friends, fetches, Buried Ruin, and Glacial Chasm (which conveniently breaks its pseudosymmetry). But it also means you can get things like Seal of Doom, Seal of Cleansing, Moriok Replica, Spore Frog, Nihil Spellbomb, and Spiketail Hatchling.

Grave is a bit weird. At a bare minimum, you're getting two 2/2s every turn. Seems minor, and on its own, it is, but with Warstorm Surge, you get two shocks and a murder (which can also be 6 to any player or planeswalker) when Grave enters, and another two shocks with each attack. With Aura Shards, that's three disenchants upon entering, two more with each attack. With Purphoros, God of the Forge, six damage to everyone else upon entering, four when attacking. These bodies can be used for sac fuel as well, meaning death triggers matter too. Oh, did I mention Panharmonicon? It's not as ridic as anything that makes four or more tokens upon entering with Purph and Panharmonicon (which is basically, yeah)

Inferno's easy to break. Just give it deathtouch or infect.

That brings us to Frost. Frost is the weakest, not offering card advantage of any sort every turn. It just is a tapper. Good, and it was annoying in Standard, but not as powerful as the others.

Red focuses more on spells, doesn't really have a lot of ways to draw more cards or cheat things into play, but I'd debate whether red or white is the worst. At least red gives us Fanatic of Mogis, Fiery Bombardment, and Thunderous Might. Heartlash Cinder does have some potential with Pandemonium, but you're better off just using Ball Lightnings most of the tme.

White is arguably worse, though, because cheaper mana costs mean fewer cards with WW or WWW in their mana cost. (Though if you're in multiple colors, Shadowmoor block gives you plenty of cards like Divinity of Pride to help you out. Plus, for both red or white, adding another color gives you card draw and ways to cheat things into play.) Wincons include Evangel of Heliod (good), Light from Within (meh, you can put it in a Kaalia deck or something like that, but it's the only anthem that doesn't help token decks at all), and Springjack Shepherd (cheaper than Evangel, but you need an anthem right away). Finishing out white devotion is Acolyte's Reward, because that's exactly what I needed.

Green has mana accel, black has reanimator spells, blue has clones. (Recall how often Rite of Replication is a devotion deck's win condition.) All of them have good card draw, and green and black have more "multiple colored mana" cards.

Quote from 3drinks »

But mask of memory is less contingent on playing an otherwise bad 3cmc 3/3, and under the same savage beating, is a +8 ca. (If you're playing this, it's because the discard is otherwise not card disadvantage).

Technically, that's +4 if you do it that way, which is still nice on its own. You can, of course, exploit your graveyard in this format pretty easily.

Anyway, Pygmy Kavu is nice in multiplayer. People forget just how strong black is in a format where you have double the starting life total. Though you still should probably use something like Darkest Hour, which also lets you use Compost.

It's not the best option for massive card draw; I prefer Viridian Revel with Mycosynth Lattice because then I can just break my opponents' stuff at my leisure. But it is still okay.

Quote from 3drinks »

You know what I like more than this card? Mask of Memory. All colourless, does virtually the same thing, and let's be honest if you're in the market to be looting, then if you can somehow draw twice off the 3/3, you wouldn't mind getting a second discard too.

Technically, if you cast Savage Beating, it becomes

discard 1
draw 2
draw 2
discard 1
draw 2
draw 2
draw 2
draw 2

Sure, it's Magical Christmasland, but the potential for +10 card advantage is there.

This can be pretty fun with minimal setup. Even more fun with double strike or multiple attacks. And it doesn't say "target", so Spirit Mantle.

An aside: You've got to love how Semitic words sound either angelic or demonic, even when it just means "helper".