PS: going over the packs rapidly, I think UR or UG would have turned out better. There were often late R or G cards, much more than W.
I don't see a single solid entry into either of these colors especially into green.
The only option for a switch into red came in the third pick with the Hammer vs. Eidolon pick. Even if the OP picked Hammer there wasn't a solid follow up red pick until possible Akroan Crusader in pick 8, at which point it's likely that you would have already moved back in on white with a divine verdict. As for green I don't see how any drafter would have moved in on green in this draft at all.
Given what was opened and where the OP was sitting I think U/W was the strongest deck available even if it wasn't the be all end all U/W deck.
P1P1: Personally I'm not a fan of Phalanx leader as I find it makes people go a bit crazy trying to force White Heroic. Sure it can win games but I don't think it's so good you need to do that to yourself. I'm more of a Griptide person here myself. Still I wouldn't say this was an incorrect pick by any means.
I don't really understand this thought process. While it is extremely difficult to know when to let go of a strong first pick, I don't think the way to solve that difficult problem is by advocating taking weaker cards. Why not just take the leader but not commit full force to it? Unless you think griptide is a stronger card, I don't really see the argument for taking it.
I'd also like to point out that people play Dragon Mantle fully content in the knowledge that all it does is cantrip and target a creature. The Lesson can target two creatures, and can potentially draw you two cards.
The Lesson is only "bad" if you're staring down a clogged board you can't get through. And even then, it triggers two Heroes and/or pretends to be a Lure effect so your other guys can get through.
That isn't all dragon mantle does though, it also let's your smaller guys trade up or become mana sinks, and is pretty silly on a cerberus.
Maybe it's just me, but I honestly don't run into too many situations where I have two heroic creatures on the board at the same time. They are such big targets both in the draft and once they hit the board that it just doesn't seem to come up all that often. So the fact that it targets two things just doesn't seem all that important to me apart from it increasing the chances that you get to cantrip.
In general I'd say the card is a low pick, but playable in certain decks.
I would take the Overlord and I wouldn't really even consider any of the other cards. In my opinion this a bomb rare, so top commons and uncommons really don't factor in my mind. I also am not going to pass what I consider to be a bomb rare to take the single strong blue card hoping to send a signal. Blue is my favorite color to play in the set, I don't really enjoy black, and yet I still think the Overlord is a windmill slam for me.
What I was really looking to know was if it had Nykthos, Jace or Cloudfin Raptor mainly. Just to know if I need them or not.
Do we know if Reid Duke is running any of those 3?
There are different mono blue decks out there. The deck tech they did was from a European team that had Jace and counter spells and no Nykthos. The Star City Games list doesn't have Jace in the main, not sure about side and does have Nykthos. I believe they both have Cloudfin Raptor and Judge's Familiar as the one drops.
ive been working on an UB Tempo build as well. Im not really a fan of Duskmantle Seer and Thoughtseize in the same deck. The life loss is on thing but its managable but as the Seer gives your opponent cards as well, he/she can more easily get out of a screw that you try to provoke with thoughtseize or lifebane zombie. On top of that i absolutely love Far/Away especially in a tempo deck but its too risky with the Duskmantle seer.
Thats why im tryin out Lilianas Reaver and Master of Waves in the 4 CMC creature slot. As mentioned before the Reaver works well with Thassa and creates alot of card advantage if you can protect him. Nightveil Specter was mentioned as well and while i dont love the card it provides the necessary devotion count for thassa and master of waves. Master of waves has been testing pretty well so far. Specter into Master is a really strong play.
And i totally agree that cloudfin raptor and woodlot crawler dont belong in the deck.
Have you given any thoughts to Desecration Demon in the four spot? My main issue when thinking about this kind of deck is that the two mana creatures in blue and black just aren't that impressive to me.
I was thinking of just going heavy black to be able to use 4 cacklers and 4 tormented heroes, and then leaving the 2 mana slot for counters, removal, and utility. I guess I would rather play 1 for a 2/1 than an extra mana to get protection green. I am must unsure about Ashiok it could either be the reason the deck is good, or just useless and why it fails. I could also use some help from someone on crafting the mana, or if it's even possible. The deck would need not need a lot of blue, but it would like it by turn two to have access to the counters. Which I suppose might not even be possible.
Craig Westcoe really loves both Ajani and Gideon in these lists.
I know the general consensus is that Gideon is awful, but isn't there a strong argument that he is better than Heliod as a 4 slot finisher in this deck? Seems more likely that would be able to attack with a 5 power indestructible creature on turn 5 if you played Gideon over Heliod.
I think it's funny how you guys assume that all players can even identify the terrible cards. Last in person pre-release I went to was Dragon's Maze and I had two opponents play Sinister Possession against me. Perhaps this isn't the best example of a bad or jank card that you guys are talking about as it could conceivably have some positive outcomes on some games, but to me it's an entirely unplayable card in any format.
Sure if you only play on Magic Online you aren't likely to run into anyone playing the worst of the worst limited cards, but there are quite a few people who enjoy the game that seem drawn to bad cards either because they find those cards fun or simply don't know they are bad.
I keep going back and forth on if this card is good or not. I think if I only knew what FlossedBeaver thought of this card I could finally make my decision. Sadly he simply won't make his feelings known.
Why are people still using Dryad Militant? Its essentially just a 2/1 for 1 at this point in the format. There are better options.
I imagine because you would need 8 one drops for this kind of deck to work. If you assume the new pro multi colored is 4 of those, then you are left with either Judge's Familiar or Boros Elite if you don't go with the Dryad. Is Dryad all that much worse than Rakdos Cakler in an aggressive deck? I'm sure the extra one toughness would come up at some point, but the ability to block might also.
This is coming from the format that allows you to put 5 of a kind due to the nature of the format. Nothing skill intensive of jamming 5 of one card into the deck because the person next to you doesn't know how to Draft and hands u amazing stuff.
Limited isn't skill intensive he says.
Reasoning?
Good players can beat bad players by taking advantage of them.
Flawless logic here.
Hero's Downfall is a pretty crappy answer to planeswalkers though since they still get to get one ability off before you destroy them, giving them the better end of the trade. Best answer to planeswalkers is to just attack them so you can kill them without spending a card doing so. Chances are, if I'm having to use this on a planeswalker, I'm not in a great spot. I want to be hitting a creature to make a hole for my creatures to attack the walker.
I just like this card for being a doom blade that can hit black creatures for one more mana. The planeswalker hitting is just an added perk.
Attacking a planeswalker with creatures is still going to be a loss in tempo, so you are going to be losing resources either way. Which is more important probably depends on the deck and game state.
I like the deck idea, although I guess I consider it more of a midrange build than a control build. Semantics aside I am not sure that Heliod is worth it. I think I would rather move towards a base red build adding in Assemble the Legion for Heliod. I also think you could up Chained to the Rocks to a 4 of if you switched to a heavier red build. I know some people have been saying that enchantment hate will be main board in a lot decks, but I'm not entirely convinced at this point. I am also wary of this Hundred-Handed One card? I know it's been getting some love, but it just doesn't seem great to me. Plus if you are for sure playing Heliod doesn't it also lose some value since the vigilance is redundant?
I certainly see the appeal of a bigger Boros build though since Reckoner is pretty strong in holding the early game and it has a lot of great finisher options.
When you are thinking of possible deck ideas what decks are you currently planning on having to beat in the early portion of standard and why? For me it is these three decks:
1. U/W control. Whether this deck splashes for black or red (green seems doubtful?) remains to be seen, but it does seem certain that a deck is going to exist that contains Supreme Verdict, Sphinx's Revelation, and to a lesser extent Azorious Charm. These cards have just proven to powerful for people to just throw them aside.
2. G/W aggro/midrange. I am not sure which is the better version, but I do know that Voice and Scavenging Ooze are great cards. Voice in particular seems to be one of the few cards in the remaining standard that stands up well to Supreme Verdict given the rotation of undying, Huntmaster, and Thragtusk. It seems like people will gravitate towards these colors for those reasons. Loxodon Smiter seems more powerful given the rotation of Cavern of Souls and GW seems to have several solid 5 drop replacements to many of the top end creatures that rotated.
3. Red aggro. This deck was very popular in block, it seems like it already has several replacements for cards that it lost. Plus red aggro has the added benefits of it being popular and cheap. If you include Rx variants going with green, black, or white as a splash/second color this could take up a large portion of the field.
I think the honorable mention goes to people trying to play G/R ramp for the new planeswalker. I don't know if this is a deck to beat because there seem to be so many different ideas as how to exactly go about doing that.
Granted there are more cards to come, but I think even if amazing cards are spoiled that these 3 or 4 decks will be the most played decks for the reasons stated. Other decks will need to preform well before they are perceived as viable to the masses. I am not saying that the top tier decks will for sure come from these decks, just that I think that these will be the most popular as they are the most tested and have the most obvious appeal.
I don't see a single solid entry into either of these colors especially into green.
The only option for a switch into red came in the third pick with the Hammer vs. Eidolon pick. Even if the OP picked Hammer there wasn't a solid follow up red pick until possible Akroan Crusader in pick 8, at which point it's likely that you would have already moved back in on white with a divine verdict. As for green I don't see how any drafter would have moved in on green in this draft at all.
Given what was opened and where the OP was sitting I think U/W was the strongest deck available even if it wasn't the be all end all U/W deck.
I don't really understand this thought process. While it is extremely difficult to know when to let go of a strong first pick, I don't think the way to solve that difficult problem is by advocating taking weaker cards. Why not just take the leader but not commit full force to it? Unless you think griptide is a stronger card, I don't really see the argument for taking it.
That isn't all dragon mantle does though, it also let's your smaller guys trade up or become mana sinks, and is pretty silly on a cerberus.
Maybe it's just me, but I honestly don't run into too many situations where I have two heroic creatures on the board at the same time. They are such big targets both in the draft and once they hit the board that it just doesn't seem to come up all that often. So the fact that it targets two things just doesn't seem all that important to me apart from it increasing the chances that you get to cantrip.
In general I'd say the card is a low pick, but playable in certain decks.
There are different mono blue decks out there. The deck tech they did was from a European team that had Jace and counter spells and no Nykthos. The Star City Games list doesn't have Jace in the main, not sure about side and does have Nykthos. I believe they both have Cloudfin Raptor and Judge's Familiar as the one drops.
Have you given any thoughts to Desecration Demon in the four spot? My main issue when thinking about this kind of deck is that the two mana creatures in blue and black just aren't that impressive to me.
I was thinking of just going heavy black to be able to use 4 cacklers and 4 tormented heroes, and then leaving the 2 mana slot for counters, removal, and utility. I guess I would rather play 1 for a 2/1 than an extra mana to get protection green. I am must unsure about Ashiok it could either be the reason the deck is good, or just useless and why it fails. I could also use some help from someone on crafting the mana, or if it's even possible. The deck would need not need a lot of blue, but it would like it by turn two to have access to the counters. Which I suppose might not even be possible.
4 Rakdos Cackler
4 Tormented Hero
4 Lifebane Zombie
4 Desecration Demon
2 Essence Scatter
2 Syncopate
2 Dissolve
2 Stymied Hopes
2 Doom Blade
1 Ultimate Price
2 Warped Physique
1 Hero's Downfall
3 Ashiok
Utility - 4
4 Thoughtseize
I know the general consensus is that Gideon is awful, but isn't there a strong argument that he is better than Heliod as a 4 slot finisher in this deck? Seems more likely that would be able to attack with a 5 power indestructible creature on turn 5 if you played Gideon over Heliod.
Sure if you only play on Magic Online you aren't likely to run into anyone playing the worst of the worst limited cards, but there are quite a few people who enjoy the game that seem drawn to bad cards either because they find those cards fun or simply don't know they are bad.
I imagine because you would need 8 one drops for this kind of deck to work. If you assume the new pro multi colored is 4 of those, then you are left with either Judge's Familiar or Boros Elite if you don't go with the Dryad. Is Dryad all that much worse than Rakdos Cakler in an aggressive deck? I'm sure the extra one toughness would come up at some point, but the ability to block might also.
Limited isn't skill intensive he says.
Reasoning?
Good players can beat bad players by taking advantage of them.
Flawless logic here.
Attacking a planeswalker with creatures is still going to be a loss in tempo, so you are going to be losing resources either way. Which is more important probably depends on the deck and game state.
I certainly see the appeal of a bigger Boros build though since Reckoner is pretty strong in holding the early game and it has a lot of great finisher options.
1. U/W control. Whether this deck splashes for black or red (green seems doubtful?) remains to be seen, but it does seem certain that a deck is going to exist that contains Supreme Verdict, Sphinx's Revelation, and to a lesser extent Azorious Charm. These cards have just proven to powerful for people to just throw them aside.
2. G/W aggro/midrange. I am not sure which is the better version, but I do know that Voice and Scavenging Ooze are great cards. Voice in particular seems to be one of the few cards in the remaining standard that stands up well to Supreme Verdict given the rotation of undying, Huntmaster, and Thragtusk. It seems like people will gravitate towards these colors for those reasons. Loxodon Smiter seems more powerful given the rotation of Cavern of Souls and GW seems to have several solid 5 drop replacements to many of the top end creatures that rotated.
3. Red aggro. This deck was very popular in block, it seems like it already has several replacements for cards that it lost. Plus red aggro has the added benefits of it being popular and cheap. If you include Rx variants going with green, black, or white as a splash/second color this could take up a large portion of the field.
I think the honorable mention goes to people trying to play G/R ramp for the new planeswalker. I don't know if this is a deck to beat because there seem to be so many different ideas as how to exactly go about doing that.
Granted there are more cards to come, but I think even if amazing cards are spoiled that these 3 or 4 decks will be the most played decks for the reasons stated. Other decks will need to preform well before they are perceived as viable to the masses. I am not saying that the top tier decks will for sure come from these decks, just that I think that these will be the most popular as they are the most tested and have the most obvious appeal.
Any additions or changes?