I haven't posted on Salvation in a long time, but I just wanted to say I recently built a Duskmantle Guildmage + Mindcrank combo deck on MTGO, since it's super cheap to build(Most expensive cards being Lotus Bloom, Watery Grave, and Serum Visions).
I feel like this deck has really flown under the radar. This combo is incredibly consistent. I have gotten multiple turn 4 kills with it, and even more turn 5-6. It backs things up by playing Duress and Mana Leak and the funny thing about the combo is that you can trigger it yourself(with Piranha Marsh or Thought Scour) or you can just wait for them to do something to kill themselves(like trying to kill the Guildmage, in response you activate and they trigger the combo with their own card), etc.
Now, I've seen the argument before that this deck isn't good because 'the individual pieces suck'. I dunno. I think the strength of this deck is the fact that it can go get its pieces pretty quickly with the 8x Transmute cards I play(Muddle the Mixture and Dimir Infiltrator).
I don't think combo is dead in Modern, people just don't bother trying anything new for the most part. Hell, I can remember infinite mana/damage combos from Kamigawa/Ravnica Standard that still exist in modern that I've never seen anyone try in Modern(Izzet Guildmage/Splicing Mechanic with Desperate Ritual and Glacial Ray)
I quit playing B/R zombies because of Thragtusk, switched to a B/R control type. I don't mind playing match ups against it now. Slaughter games or Appetite for Brains are great answers to the card, or making them discard it with Rakdos Return, which is sort of rare due to people usually holding it back unless it's late game and you force them to play something else. If I know Thragtusk is in a deck, my first target with Slaughter games is usually Thragtusk.
Well that's my point. The card is so busted that its made an entire deck/archetype disappear. The only people defending this card are the people who enjoy abusing it and winning easy games.
Attack the decks that use Thragtusk from different angles. Use milling, since it doesnt attack life totals, start packing dissipates in your control decks, if your damage based, try and outrace it or use burn spells to do more damage than they gain life. Thragtusk only dominates because players allow him too. He's a good card, but lets be serious, decks can be built to have alternate strategies of lines of play that can out maneuver it. But, it does require practice, and reevaluating cards and choices.
I understand this, but what it does essentially is destroy an entire archetype, that being aggro, or quick aggro decks. You have to take a quick aggro deck, like R/B Zombies for example, and make it a stupid midrange control deck. The card is so busted it completely destroys the viability of entire strategies and decks.
There's something wrong there, don't you think? Or maybe we should just all play midrange fatty wars, which is apparently what Wizards wants us to do.
You don't depend on alchemist to do mill. That is playing like a bad magic player. His ability does not require to attack. U just have him sit there and then mill thin as u normally would. That allows you to passively make creatures. The creatures just act to clog the board with tokens that u use as blockers. Then, if it is profitable for u to do so, u can attack.
I understand the strategy but it's a horrible thing to try and base a deck around a 2 toughness creature when every deck plays answers to a 2 toughness creature. Pillar of Flame, Searing Spear, Dreadbore, Ultimate Price, Auger Spree, etc are all things that can be played to kill that thing deader than hell. And if your answer is to say, okay, I'm playing counterspells...are you really going to wait until turn 6 to have 6 mana to be able to Negate something after playing him? If thats the case, you'll probably already be dead to Thragtusk or Angel of Serenity.
I'm just saying that you have to create a deck that plays a different game of Magic in order to make mill viable. You have to produce dead cards in your opponents deck, which is exactly what something like I described does. The look on peoples faces when they have a hand full of something like Ultimate Price or Essence Scatter is priceless.
The most creative thing I can do is just spectral flight a Geist of Saint Traft.
Yeah, screw you Thragtusk and your 5 lifegain.
Yep. My point exactly. Magic's current T2 answers to broken creatures is play a more broken creature. Not a good spell or anything. Just a more broken creature. What a joke.
If you want it to be competitive, the best way is basically to play a control deck. UB Control with Nephalia Drownyard was a somewhat viable choice at times during the last rotation. It's not popular now, but it should be viable once the Dimir cards in Gatecrash are released. Drownyard is effective because it's repeatable and difficult to get rid of (Besides Ghost Quarter and Acidic Slime, there's almost no way to remove lands in Standard.)
Cards like Mind Sculpt and Dream Twist are bad because they're one shot. Undead Alchemist is bad because you have to deal damage to your opponent, and it's much easier to deal 20 damage to an opponent rather than 50 damage. The viable mill-based wincons in Standard are Nephalia Drownyard, Jace, Memory Adept, and to a lesser extent Sands of Delirium. The rest of the deck should be focused on shutting down your opponent, because all three of those options take a long time to finish the game. Counterspells, wraths, and removal are all necessary.
Pretty much exactly how the deck me and my friend made works except it does White/Blue and Enchantments. If you get Sphere of Safety and a bunch of enchantments on the board its nearly impossible to fight through that, and it IS impossible to fight through it with 2 Spheres on board. Basically, to make mill viable, you have to slow the game down.
So yeah, doing mill with creatures like Alchemist and Mindcrusher is a horrible strategy.
I guess I've had a different experience in my local shop meta than you guys have. The guy who plays Thragtusk also plays Huntmaster and Wolfir Silverheart and Rancor and Kessig Wolf Run. So just saying that Thragtusk is something you can ignore is a joke when you can give it X/0 and Trample with Wolf Run or 2/0 Trample with Rancors(Usually multiple by that point). And what, what are you going to do? Ultimate Price it? Auger Spree it? Wow. Like that did anything. They just put all that stuff on the token they get. Or in my experience they lucksack 9 times out of 10 into another Thragtusk or a Bonfire to blow you out.
Thragtusk is by far and large the single most broken card in T2...WHEN you take into consideration everything that plays with it. The fact of the matter is the card should have said died on the token part and not leaves play. If that was the case, the card would be fine. I could deal with 5 life for a 5/3 that gets a 3/3 when it dies. You could just play Annihilating Fire at that point, or double Pillar of Flame and still get by. But no, you can't do that. You can't even O-ring it and get value. There is no. Single. Way. To. Deal. With. This. Card. ADVANTAGEOUSLY.
I'd also be fine if in Gatecrash they print some kind of card like Flames of the Blood Hand. That would fix things as well.
I'd also like to note that playing a 4/2 for 4 like Undead Alchemist is a bad idea in a meta entirely composed of 8 out of 10 people playing Pillar of Flame maindeck. This is why I choose to go creatureless.
Me and my friend have made a viable, competitive mill deck. It's really a lockdown deck, and the win condition happens to be mill. Basically, we play U/W control with Supreme Verdict, Sphere of Safety, and Oblivion Rings, Detention Spheres, Pacifisms, Arrests, and so on. The deck has 1 single win condition, the 4 Jace, Memory Adept. You just do his 0 ability until they lose.
The card draw engine is 3 Sphinx's Revelation, which can be a beating for certain decks. You have to play 20+ creature control enchantments to deal with the current meta of LOLIPLAYFATTIES.
The sideboard takes care of everything that hoses it, with cards like Rest in Peace, Nevermore, Witchbane Orb, and some other stuff that slips my mind. Oh, also it plays Sands of Delirium in the sideboard as an alternate win condition for when they sideboard in a Nevermore of their own for Jace, or Pithing Needle for Jace, or Slaughter Games.
I helped design the thing but my friend pilots it all the time. It felt pretty awful last FNM when I lost to the damned thing while trying to play Rakdos Aggro.
This is the best thing I could think up as far as mill.
I find it so amusing people are defending Thragtusk. You guys have to understand that this card has no legitimate good answers. You can say Appetite for Brains and Slaughter Games all day, but aggro decks having to play garbage control cards just to deal with a card thats in every deck is ridiculous. Like seriously, I just played my first 4 Round Swiss Standard event on MTGO, havent even played MTGO in 2 years, and every single round was some deck with a Thragtusk. Every. Single. Deck.
The card is degenerate, it completely crushes all aggro/red based strategies, and there's no real answer to it. Telling me to play Appetite for Brains and Slaughter Games is like the biggest cop out ever. I get that some of you like to play broken easy mode cards, but that doesn't mean its right, or that it won't get banned just because you enjoy winning games of Magic with no skill whatsoever.
There's literally almost less than 10% skill in Magic required to play Standard right now because of Thragtusk. Everyone literally just sits there playing fatties and cloudshifting them with other broken cards until someone wins. Or someone plays Angel of Serenity. It's just a stupid fatty war, it's a serious joke, and Thragtusk is the root of it.
The only strategies that truly existed in Magic back in the day that would be good against a card like Thragtusk have been nerfed into oblivion, like land destruction(cant get 5 mana to play it) and discard.
So Wizards has created this meta in T2 right now that 100% revolves around Thragtusk. You either play that card, or you lose. Period. And those of you who say otherwise haven't been playing T2 with your eyes open, or are people who abuse the card.
I'd also like to say that if you're playing Delver, Snapcaster, and Talrand(Like I currently am in T2) that the more non-instant and sorceries you play(like Guttersnipe), the worse those cards all become.
Especially with no way set it up otherwise(Ponder). In all honesty, I'd keep the creature count at like 12 and basically take out Talrand for Guttersnipe. Thinking about it more, Guttersnipe seems better than Talrand in almost every scenario(And I currently paly Talrand in my deck). I mean, think about it...Guttersnipe isn't legendary, so you can have multiple in play. The damage he does can't be creature killed, etc. So yeah. That's my two cents. Play with less non-instant and sorceries, and you'll be golden.
I like the card. It's pretty damn good. But how are you going to cast a 5 mana artifact off the back of a 3 mana artifact on turn 3 exactly?
Turn 1: Forest, Arbor Elf, Go
Turn 2: Forest, Chromatic Lantern, Go
Turn 3: Forest, Gilded Lotus, Go
Turn 4: Land, Nicol Bolas, Go
Turn 5: Anything I want, including your mother.
PS: if you didn't read the card, it can tap for mana itself, so essentially on turn 3 you have 3 lands, lantern, and arbor elf for mana.
For those of you thinking this is just a Commander/EDH card and not constructed playable, I'll see you at FNM with my Door to Nothingness, and my turn 3 Thragtusk or Garruk. Or turn 3 Gilded Lotus into turn 4 Nicol Bolas.
It's a very, very good card. And I hope everyone thinks it isnt playable in constructed, so that I can get a playset for like 4 dollars.
I feel like this deck has really flown under the radar. This combo is incredibly consistent. I have gotten multiple turn 4 kills with it, and even more turn 5-6. It backs things up by playing Duress and Mana Leak and the funny thing about the combo is that you can trigger it yourself(with Piranha Marsh or Thought Scour) or you can just wait for them to do something to kill themselves(like trying to kill the Guildmage, in response you activate and they trigger the combo with their own card), etc.
Now, I've seen the argument before that this deck isn't good because 'the individual pieces suck'. I dunno. I think the strength of this deck is the fact that it can go get its pieces pretty quickly with the 8x Transmute cards I play(Muddle the Mixture and Dimir Infiltrator).
I don't think combo is dead in Modern, people just don't bother trying anything new for the most part. Hell, I can remember infinite mana/damage combos from Kamigawa/Ravnica Standard that still exist in modern that I've never seen anyone try in Modern(Izzet Guildmage/Splicing Mechanic with Desperate Ritual and Glacial Ray)
Anyways, just my 2 cents on combo in Modern.
Well that's my point. The card is so busted that its made an entire deck/archetype disappear. The only people defending this card are the people who enjoy abusing it and winning easy games.
I understand this, but what it does essentially is destroy an entire archetype, that being aggro, or quick aggro decks. You have to take a quick aggro deck, like R/B Zombies for example, and make it a stupid midrange control deck. The card is so busted it completely destroys the viability of entire strategies and decks.
There's something wrong there, don't you think? Or maybe we should just all play midrange fatty wars, which is apparently what Wizards wants us to do.
I understand the strategy but it's a horrible thing to try and base a deck around a 2 toughness creature when every deck plays answers to a 2 toughness creature. Pillar of Flame, Searing Spear, Dreadbore, Ultimate Price, Auger Spree, etc are all things that can be played to kill that thing deader than hell. And if your answer is to say, okay, I'm playing counterspells...are you really going to wait until turn 6 to have 6 mana to be able to Negate something after playing him? If thats the case, you'll probably already be dead to Thragtusk or Angel of Serenity.
I'm just saying that you have to create a deck that plays a different game of Magic in order to make mill viable. You have to produce dead cards in your opponents deck, which is exactly what something like I described does. The look on peoples faces when they have a hand full of something like Ultimate Price or Essence Scatter is priceless.
Yep. My point exactly. Magic's current T2 answers to broken creatures is play a more broken creature. Not a good spell or anything. Just a more broken creature. What a joke.
Pretty much exactly how the deck me and my friend made works except it does White/Blue and Enchantments. If you get Sphere of Safety and a bunch of enchantments on the board its nearly impossible to fight through that, and it IS impossible to fight through it with 2 Spheres on board. Basically, to make mill viable, you have to slow the game down.
So yeah, doing mill with creatures like Alchemist and Mindcrusher is a horrible strategy.
Thragtusk is by far and large the single most broken card in T2...WHEN you take into consideration everything that plays with it. The fact of the matter is the card should have said died on the token part and not leaves play. If that was the case, the card would be fine. I could deal with 5 life for a 5/3 that gets a 3/3 when it dies. You could just play Annihilating Fire at that point, or double Pillar of Flame and still get by. But no, you can't do that. You can't even O-ring it and get value. There is no. Single. Way. To. Deal. With. This. Card. ADVANTAGEOUSLY.
I'd also be fine if in Gatecrash they print some kind of card like Flames of the Blood Hand. That would fix things as well.
The card draw engine is 3 Sphinx's Revelation, which can be a beating for certain decks. You have to play 20+ creature control enchantments to deal with the current meta of LOLIPLAYFATTIES.
The sideboard takes care of everything that hoses it, with cards like Rest in Peace, Nevermore, Witchbane Orb, and some other stuff that slips my mind. Oh, also it plays Sands of Delirium in the sideboard as an alternate win condition for when they sideboard in a Nevermore of their own for Jace, or Pithing Needle for Jace, or Slaughter Games.
I helped design the thing but my friend pilots it all the time. It felt pretty awful last FNM when I lost to the damned thing while trying to play Rakdos Aggro.
This is the best thing I could think up as far as mill.
The card is degenerate, it completely crushes all aggro/red based strategies, and there's no real answer to it. Telling me to play Appetite for Brains and Slaughter Games is like the biggest cop out ever. I get that some of you like to play broken easy mode cards, but that doesn't mean its right, or that it won't get banned just because you enjoy winning games of Magic with no skill whatsoever.
There's literally almost less than 10% skill in Magic required to play Standard right now because of Thragtusk. Everyone literally just sits there playing fatties and cloudshifting them with other broken cards until someone wins. Or someone plays Angel of Serenity. It's just a stupid fatty war, it's a serious joke, and Thragtusk is the root of it.
The only strategies that truly existed in Magic back in the day that would be good against a card like Thragtusk have been nerfed into oblivion, like land destruction(cant get 5 mana to play it) and discard.
So Wizards has created this meta in T2 right now that 100% revolves around Thragtusk. You either play that card, or you lose. Period. And those of you who say otherwise haven't been playing T2 with your eyes open, or are people who abuse the card.
Especially with no way set it up otherwise(Ponder). In all honesty, I'd keep the creature count at like 12 and basically take out Talrand for Guttersnipe. Thinking about it more, Guttersnipe seems better than Talrand in almost every scenario(And I currently paly Talrand in my deck). I mean, think about it...Guttersnipe isn't legendary, so you can have multiple in play. The damage he does can't be creature killed, etc. So yeah. That's my two cents. Play with less non-instant and sorceries, and you'll be golden.
Turn 1: Forest, Arbor Elf, Go
Turn 2: Forest, Chromatic Lantern, Go
Turn 3: Forest, Gilded Lotus, Go
Turn 4: Land, Nicol Bolas, Go
Turn 5: Anything I want, including your mother.
PS: if you didn't read the card, it can tap for mana itself, so essentially on turn 3 you have 3 lands, lantern, and arbor elf for mana.
It's a very, very good card. And I hope everyone thinks it isnt playable in constructed, so that I can get a playset for like 4 dollars.
Awesome card.