In order for it to be mainboardable, It would have to gain so much life that a storm deck can't beat it without some sort of loop. Alternatively, It can reliably turn on serra ascendant, turn 2 across fetches and bolts. That's probably around 15 life.
If necropotence got un-banned, it might actually be main-deckable around 4 life again.
Most decks that run Emrakul are perfectly capable of hardcasting her if the game gets drawn out. Even if your opponent cheats Emrakul into play, Karakas is just delaying it a turn or two.
Someone mentioned Mangara of Corondor. Mangara + Karakas is a pretty good answer to Emrakul (of course, it's a pretty good answer to any creature that doesn't have protection from Mangara in some way).
Are we talking about the same Legacy format here? I don't think we're on the same page. The only time Emrakul in Legacy gets cast is through a Shelldock Isle, and that's still cheating the 15 mana casting cost. In Legacy, given the speed of the format, Karakas is typically a fine answer to Emrakul.
Hell, I don't think any decks other than Hive Mind run enough fetchable lands to hardcast Emrakul... and I doubt even most Hive Mind players have hard cast Emrakuls with their Grim Monoliths and Sol lands. Even if those decks did run enough fetchable lands, it would take an extremely long game to get that 15 lands out. And by then, time would already have been called. Closest I've seen my brother get with Hive Mind was 11 mana.
I don't know much about 12-post, but it seems like the kind of deck that might play Emrakul.
Elves certainly has enough mana to cast an Emrakul, and It's perfectly viable for elves to run 1 in the 75 if you're expecting grindstone decks.
Enchantress doesn't see much play nowadays, but some versions of that play Emrakul, and play their own karakas to bounce it as a win con.
if Wizards R&D are so concerned with making the game simple and accessible, why do they keep adding these keywords when a simple plain-english "This card has no color" will do? That way, new players don't have to learn extra unnecessary keywords.
Spelling out that Devoid = colorless is simple and clear. It means you only have to read it once and then you can skim past it every time after that. Plus it allows other cards to add devoid or reference devoid, but I don't imagine they'll use it that way. Changeling was similarly simple.
You can say that exact same thing about hundreds of keywords individually, but every time a new keyword is created, that's one more word that a player needs to memorize in order to master the game, and the added complexity adds up over the years.
This is especially evident to me when playing EDH with players who didn't play the blocks the cards were released in; One of the more minor reasons Wizards justify these keywords is that it means they can have one or two more complex cards using those keywords without using up text space, because all the other cards in the set explain those keywords ... but if those one or two cards are the only such cards included in your EDH deck, suddenly the EDH deck you handed out contains these mysterious keywords that have no explanation attached to them.
You can't complain about too many mechanics when you are playing a format designed for the wackiest interactions. That's like saying that you watch NASCAR for the crashes, but don't like when the paint is chipped of the car.
That's a bad analogy. Keywords don't make interactions any more "wacky". All it serves to do is obfuscate those mechanics for players with less experience.
if Wizards R&D are so concerned with making the game simple and accessible, why do they keep adding these keywords when a simple plain-english "This card has no color" will do? That way, new players don't have to learn extra unnecessary keywords.
Spelling out that Devoid = colorless is simple and clear. It means you only have to read it once and then you can skim past it every time after that. Plus it allows other cards to add devoid or reference devoid, but I don't imagine they'll use it that way. Changeling was similarly simple.
You can say that exact same thing about hundreds of keywords individually, but every time a new keyword is created, that's one more word that a player needs to memorize in order to master the game, and the added complexity adds up over the years.
if Wizards R&D are so concerned with making the game simple and accessible, why do they keep adding these keywords when a simple plain-english "This card has no color" will do? That way, new players don't have to learn extra unnecessary keywords.
I'm honestly a little surprised there isn't a thread about this yet, but what are people's impressions of Donald Trump? Is this run actually serious? Is his performance sustainable? Can he feasibly win the nomination or the presidency? What are the implications of his run and his success if we deem it possible?
Honestly, I kinda like the fact that Trump has high poll numbers only because the idea of him having the highest poll numbers is entertaining to me.
I see, that clarifies things. I didn't realize that the damage from Polukranos worked differently from other "Fight" mechanics.
There is a specific ruling associated with the fight mechanic that causes creatures not to deal damage.
701.10b If a creature instructed to fight is no longer on the battlefield or is no longer a creature, no damage is dealt. If a creature is an illegal target for a resolving spell or ability that instructs it to fight, no damage is dealt.
Additionally, If a spell that says "target creature deals x damage", if the "target" is removed, it doesn't deal any damage. This has to do with that creature being an illegal target. This comes up with cards like Flesh // Blood
If you target the same creature multiple times, the second one will fail to resolve, because it's target is gone. Since the card has changed zones, It's considered to be a completely different object when it returns.
I have a relative that works in insurance, dealing with large aircraft that have policies near a billion dollars on them. (Third party damage being most of that).
I asked them what fair market price to insure a nuclear plant against the prospect of a Fukushima-style incident would be. Low but non-zero risk (I used the figure 'one catastrophic failure per 500 years'), damage bills in the low 12 figures (100-200 billion USD).
His answer - not available at any price from any insurer.
The nuclear industry would close tomorrow if it wasn't underwritten by massive state handouts in the form of free insurance - and look how much that has cost both the Japanese people and their government just in residential properties rendered permanently unliveable.
On the non-economic impacts - the industry has extreme ties to the military. The USA knows this - it's why they don't want Iran or North Korea having civilian nuclear power. It does not take long to repurpose a civilian nuclear plant to have it produce weapons instead, and nuclear proliferation is (IMO) a bigger threat than climate change is.
Why does the nuclear industry need an outside entity to handle insurance? Is the industry not large enough to provide each-other insurance?
Not every color combination is going to be the strongest all the time. If you assume that every allied 1, 2, and 3 color combination rotates equally, then you'd expect UB to be the best every 15 seasons, and it was like 8 seasons ago where the faeries deck was the best.
I honestly don't get how people keep complaining about Blue and black getting shafted, especially after ravnica/theros standard where mono-blue and mono-black were at the top of the food chain, and where esper decks were viable.
That's the thing, though: how would that be the fault of Snapcaster? If a spell is so powerful that Snapcaster flashing it back is game breaking, is that not the fault of the spell itself? Sure, Snapcaster can act as a spell 5-8 (with 2 mana on top of each casting), but so does just drawing those spells.
they banned pod, because of design restricting reasons, why would they handle snap any different?
he is different from pod but brings similar problems for the design department.
snapcaster doesn't tutor cards out of your library.
Kaalia isn't competitive? I understand stuff like Grand Arbiter and decks like that are competitive, but i'd think that Kaalia could be a decent competitive deck. What commanders do you consider competitive Izzetmage?
Here are a few commanders that I'd consider to be more competitive than Kaalia
In order for it to be mainboardable, It would have to gain so much life that a storm deck can't beat it without some sort of loop. Alternatively, It can reliably turn on serra ascendant, turn 2 across fetches and bolts. That's probably around 15 life.
If necropotence got un-banned, it might actually be main-deckable around 4 life again.
I don't know much about 12-post, but it seems like the kind of deck that might play Emrakul.
Elves certainly has enough mana to cast an Emrakul, and It's perfectly viable for elves to run 1 in the 75 if you're expecting grindstone decks.
Enchantress doesn't see much play nowadays, but some versions of that play Emrakul, and play their own karakas to bounce it as a win con.
As for one I actually use in legacy, staff of domination stops emrakul pretty well
You can also block it with 15 flying squirrel tokens
That's a bad analogy. Keywords don't make interactions any more "wacky". All it serves to do is obfuscate those mechanics for players with less experience.
You can say that exact same thing about hundreds of keywords individually, but every time a new keyword is created, that's one more word that a player needs to memorize in order to master the game, and the added complexity adds up over the years.
Honestly, I kinda like the fact that Trump has high poll numbers only because the idea of him having the highest poll numbers is entertaining to me.
That doesn't mean I'm gonna vote for him.
There is a specific ruling associated with the fight mechanic that causes creatures not to deal damage.
Additionally, If a spell that says "target creature deals x damage", if the "target" is removed, it doesn't deal any damage. This has to do with that creature being an illegal target. This comes up with cards like Flesh // Blood
If you target the same creature multiple times, the second one will fail to resolve, because it's target is gone. Since the card has changed zones, It's considered to be a completely different object when it returns.
Why does the nuclear industry need an outside entity to handle insurance? Is the industry not large enough to provide each-other insurance?
I honestly don't get how people keep complaining about Blue and black getting shafted, especially after ravnica/theros standard where mono-blue and mono-black were at the top of the food chain, and where esper decks were viable.
snapcaster doesn't tutor cards out of your library.
Here are a few commanders that I'd consider to be more competitive than Kaalia
Sharuum the Hegemon, Azusa, Lost but Seeking, Riku of Two Reflections, Narset, Enlightened Master, child of alara