Here's a thought: Charge us an annual fee. It seems that most here would rather stay on MTGSalvation, and if it means we need to pay a few dollars to keep it alive it seems like a better option than the forums dying.
Reminds me of when IMDB closed its boards. We need somewhere to go but there won't be an option that is good enough.
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- Dunharrow
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Member for 6 years, 2 months, and 4 days
Last active Wed, Jun, 26 2019 16:48:50
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You misunderstand me. Artifact hate kills the artifacts you need to have in play to go off with Paradox Engine. A turn 4 shatterstorm means that PE is unlikely to do anything should anyone play it. You also have the added benefit of disrupting people's mana.
Vehemently disagree with this poster about PoK. You always had a creature to cast. All you needed for PoK to be good was cards in hand and a commander in the command zone. The main difference is also that turn 5 PoK on an empty board is a threat that needs to be answered that same turn, and PE is a turn 5 do nothing on an empty board that you can answer any time.
Sylvan primordial was banned because by itself it was too much value. Protean Hulk was unbanned. Which card is more powerful?
If you can understand why SP was banned but PH was unbanned, you will understand why PE is not in contention for banning.
'Too good in a very specific deck' is not grounds for banning. It never has and never will be.
I mentioned all of these lands....
These lands are not always good... depends on the deck. Most of the time I expect two colour decks to play some of them.
So, if you were play Niv-Mizzet, would you play Evolving wilds or Swiftwater Cliffs? You are not playing 20 basics. You need some subpar lands.. right? EW interacts with more, that's for sure. Delve, copy effects, graveyard recursion, landfall.
I don't know. The main thing I am seeing is that there are way more good lands for allied-pairs than enemy pairs in EDH.
Honestly, if PE was a card I saw at non-cEDH tables, I could get on board with banning it. But the fact remains that the only times I see it in non-cEDH decks is my own Phenax, god of deception. I never see the card.
T&N is so much more present in 50-75% metas.
And here is the main talking points, I think:
- PoK could go into any UGx deck and do well. If you had creatures, it let you play creatures at 4x the rate of your opponents. If you played spells, it let you play instants and flash in your commander before your next turn. It was always good, and made the rest of your deck broken. PoK almost always did something because at the least you could cast your commander and you were in the main card-draw colours. The main issue with PoK, however, was that if you didn't kill it the turn it came down, you would never get the chance. You could not wait until your turn and cast Damnation. You could not wait until your turn and tutor your spot removal spell. Once they untapped, it was nearly impossible to kill PoK. Whether or not you played combo did not matter, it was a value engine that took over the game within one turn cycle.
- PE does absolutely nothing by itself. You need to follow-up with a spell to do anything with it. Meaning, it is not a good play if you have 5 mana. You need more mana or you give your opponents a whole turn cycle to deal with it. Next, if you have no mana dorks or mana rocks, PE is not broken. As creatures and artifacts are the two easiest permanents to destroy, I do not believe that, on average, people have enough of these permanents to go off. Finally, you play PE specifically to combo off. It is like High Tide. The percentage of EDH players who want to combo off is relatively low. This is why most of us do not see PE very often.
Much of your argument has been that PE is abusable in most decks most of the time - that most decks have enough mana rocks to take advantage of PE. I just went through the 21 decks 'random deck of the week' thread. None had PE. 3-4 of them had enough mana rocks to take advantage of PE should it have been in the list.
I understand your point about it being a degenerate card. I understand that it is very present in your circle. I know it is a staple of cEDH. cEDH is not noteworthy, though, since it is an unmanageable format. PE should not be banned for cEDH any more than any other combo card.
I am just pointing out that it is not very present in Commander as a whole, and that the average commander deck, whether or not it is correct, does not have 10+ mana rocks. I think they usually have between 3 and 6 mana rocks. Mana dorks almost only exist in cEDH... understandably, since losing your mana ramp to wrath of god is frustrating.
Please keep in mind that EDHRec bases its stats on people posting decks online. People who post decks online are a minority of commander players. The people who post online are on average More competitive and more invested in magic than people who do not post online. The price of PE is thankfully another reason why it does not show up in the same numbers as PoK did.
I want you to know that I take all your arguments as valid and interesting arguments. I just do not agree with your take on what the implications are. I think our main disagreement is about what percentage of decks can actually utilize PE.
If I had PE showing up as often as you do, I would be playing a lot more artifact hate. Cleansing Nova, Vandalblast, Shatterstorm, even more ETB creatures that break artifacts. If everyone has 10+ artifacts these cards will always be good.
Got me thinking.
If you are playing a 2-colour deck and do not want to run 7 fetchlands (maybe because you do not like playing off-colour fetches or maybe because of budget), what is better? Something like Scoured Barrens or Evolving Wilds/Terramorphic Expanse?
Taplands will fix multiple colours. I expect most 2-colour decks are playing a scryland, a cycle land (if you are in an allied colour pair), and maybe a ravnica bounce land.
After that, there are gates, the ones that gain you life, and just generic come into play tapped lands.
Where would you rank TE and EW in there?
TE and EW will only fix for one colour, but they give you a shuffle effect, a land in the graveyard (for delve or for other interactions), and you can copy the activated ability. Their value changes depending on the deck. Most Ux decks should run them in my opinion as they can fuel Treasure Cruise and Dig Through Time.
I actually find the 2-colour mana base to be the toughest to build in commander. How many basics can you play? Are Panoramas better than lands that enter tapped?
In a 2 colour deck, assuming 38 lands, you have
1. 1-7 fetch
2. 1 ABUR dual
3. 1 Shockland
4. 1 Checkland
5. 1 Command Tower
6. 1 Painland
7. 1 Filterland
8. 1 Prismatic Vista
So you have 9-17 locked in cards, depending on how you feel about fetches. Let's say 17.
Then you get into things that are not in every colour pairing. I believe this list gives you between 1 and 5 lands.
9. Tainted lands / one of the 3 remaining Future Sight lands / BFZ Duals / SOI Reveal lands / Canopy lands / Battlebond lands / Odyssey Filter lands
That makes up to 22 lands that enter untapped most of the time.
Then there are the best lands that enter tapped
10. Manlands / Scry lands / Ravnica Bounce Lands / Cycle Lands / / Fast lands (listed as tapped lands because most of the time they enter tapped in EDH).
11. Myriad Landscape and Path of Ancestry imo are pretty good
This would be another 7-11 lands. Our list is now between 18 and 29 lands.
Finally, we get to EW, TE, gates, lands that gain life, etc. If you are GW, you already have 29 lands here, so you can plug in some basics and be done. But if you are Izzet, you have 18 lands and need another 20. I think 20 basics is too many, so I would definitely want some of the weaker lands. Do you put City of Brass into your 2 colour deck? Or do you play TE and EW to have a shuffle effect/graveyard interaction/etc?
What if you do not want 7 fetches in each two colour deck and you do not have ABUR duals? Then you have a lot more open slots. Again, what do you do?
I do not know where to put Mirage Fetches on this list. I guess they are better than EW and TE in allied-colours, but in enemy colours they are probably worse. If you do not have an ABUR dual in your Izzet deck, there is only one 2-colour land the mirage fetches can get. EW is definitely better in that case.
Notes
*Maybe I missed some lands
**Not including utility lands that do not fix for mana. Depending on your colour requirements and the deck's interactions, you may not want any and you may want 10 of them. Hard to include in this list.
In any case, two colour decks are challenging because you are often forced to play subpar lands to fix your mana or a large number of basics. There may be certain synergistic considerations that influence which lands you play, but for the most part, for Boros, Izzet and Simic decks (which have the fewest fixing lands), would you play Evolving Wilds or Swiftwater Cliffs?
It is almost combo, actually, in that when you cast Morophon you should be able to cast all the creatures in your hand for free. The only exceptions should be the disruptive cards like Thalia, Guardian of Thraben.
If I were making the deck I would do the following:
- All hatebear humans
- All humans who draw cards at a good rate
- aggressive humans that are free with Morophon
Rest of the deck can be a few good draw effects, protection against wraths and spot removal.
Makes me think of Mappo Runt.
Gifted Aetherborn is good
Ophiomancer
you missed Ruthless ripper
Blind Obedience is great
Maybe Vengeful Pharaoh?
You are low on lands. I think you need at least 36.
You can win with a big debt to the deathless. You can also throw in Kokusho, the Evening Star or Gray Merchant of Asphodel... not bad with the recursion you have in the deck.
I don't disagree with your comments but I think it is funny to say that you haven't been this interested in a core set since Origins... Core 2019 being the only set since Origins.
Leyline + Cage could be reprinted now maybe because there is a lack of graveyard decks in the next year. Think of Crucible of Worlds and Scapeshift. They were not played in Standard at all. Leyline and Cage are very strong cards and I am guessing that if they had a graveyard theme they would not want to squash it with such powerful hate.
It also helps to sell packs of Core Sets.
*Says PE should be banned for prevalence in EDH
*Also points out that maybe 1 in 18 decks plays it
Were you playing when PoK was legal? It was in 2-3 decks in every single game of magic I played, and I played a lot in those days. Of UGx decks, I would say it was in more than half of the decks, and that it warped gameplay completely. I would not tap out once the UG player had 4 mana because I didn't want to lose to PoK the next turn. By itself, it could win you the game.
PE is not the same at all. Not as prevalent by a longshot, despite being legal in 100% of decks.
I understand that it can make for long turns, but you know what - so does Top, Sylvan Library, and so many other cards.
You are comparing to PoK but I would compare to Food Chain. Food Chain is deplorable when it is played because it almost always marks the end of the game. What a bad card for EDH where you always have access to a creature to exile and a creature to cast. But you know what, Food Chain only fits in certain specific decks. Of my 17 decks, only MW and Karador could benefit from 'cloning' a food chain. None of my other decks would benefit in any way I can think of. PE is similar - if I am playing MW or a Gx deck with lots of dorks, sure, PE cloning could benefit me... but most of my other decks would prefer to clone a sol ring.
It sees play in 70% of Arcum decks? Arcum has a tap ability and does really well with Artifacts. Thousand-Year Elixir sees just as much play.
I totally agree with Kelzam's post. I am sick and tired of seeing the same points repeated over and over again. We know the RC has kept an eye on it. Clearly they have never felt the need to ban it. It isn't seeing more and more play - just maybe more play in certain new decks.
To be ubiquitous enough to be banned, it isn't about being prevalent in Arcum decks or Selvala decks. Those decks are toxic, and I have no interest in playing against them. To be ubiquitous enough to be banned, an artifact like this would have to be played in at least 25% of decks before you can even think about it.
I am willing to bet that Sylvan Primordial was played in more than half of green decks at the time of banning. PoK was probably in close to 75% of UG decks.
Next time you watch a game of Commander clash, throw in PE on turn 5 and let me know what it does to the game. People play mana rocks but they get blown up. People play dorks but they die. PE relies on having a threshold of the two easiest types of permanents to destroy in magic.
So, Pokken, I get that you hate the card (and I would too if my meta was full of it), but can we just bury this dead horse?
This seems so powerful.
Faithless looting and tome scour will play well with this.
I know the card is a literal blank when there is graveyard hate, but this seems so versatile. Leyline of the Void will be huge in standard because of this card.
Cool design
I would be surprised to see it anywhere else ever.