MTG Salvation

Toshiro Umezawa

Creature dies, instant gets flashback. I'm wondering how effective/fun this has been for anyone who has cubed with him?

The strategy I'm trying to push for are some black control variables that interact with the graveyard, to which this guy has the capacity to be extremely annoying in mono and multicolor decks.

Quote from rancored_elf »

Quote from Godec »

Quote from rancored_elf »

WtoC is stealing from the secondary market again. But who can blame them? It's easy, legal, and most of the participants in the secondary market aren't smart enough to understand it's happening. And so it will continue and accelerate.

Uh....what? By having reprints and causing devaluation of singles stock? It's definitely good for access to have reprints.

Of course it's "good for access", ie, there are more copies available. And it also steals from the secondary market, as I said.
You could say that the Federal Reserve printing trillions of dollars per year is "good for access" because now there are more dollars to go around. That's a good thing for some people, and for others (such as anyone with savings in dollars) it's called theft through inflation.
I hope you just learned something

That's also an Austrian Economics point of view about "making something more." While we can talk about the damage that the Phillip's Curve did to the economy prior to the "Reagan Revolution" from rampant inflation, Weimar Republic, or the classic Fiat Money Inflation in France. What separates the damaging effects of the Phillip's Curve was that there was an understanding that "inflation is bad to fix unemployment," which is a part of not what was understood by Keynes that under a financial recession it makes to print like mad. Since the contraction of specie currency has occurred multiple times in US history as compared to Canadian history, mainly from lack of strict banking standards, the mechanics used in say the 1921 recession won't work. Banking panics, which is compared to say a card game printing like mad to stay afloat or the "TNN problem" which is a perspective of fairness.

What you have to look at is that the Reserved List hasn't been altered, this is the "reserve gold" currency for Magic. Which is fine, if you can afford or ignore them. However, for secondary market there has been a grave dislike towards never reprinting a card. We must also face up to the point that WotC prints money as a product and not a currency, and without live events and relationship building there's really no Magic brand. While the reserve list has many flaws, they have kept to it and made it stricter over the years.

Which begets the understanding that for straight collectors having their cards "devalued" also comes at a risk to the investor. If you invest into a product that are not on the reserved list, then you are understanding that treating the collectible features of the game as a form of reserve like a 401k or business venture. However, then we have to bring up the concept of stocks, which is arguably considered one of the most efficient markets in the world, in how card prices fluctuates. This means that modern portfolio theory if you hold onto specific different types of cards such as reserved list cards and different format staples that overall "in general" the value of your card stock would remain the same and increase over time.

So if WotC were to do a "card buyback policy" then the market would increase in price, however this is a problem with companies buying out stock and it's specifically designed for stores such as SGC to do that trend in the "card market" as compared to the "stock market." Arguably, this is a problem with collectors who do not sell other goods. When you look at SCG's product listing as well as premium article services, they've expanded their services to bring in profits. The same with Channel Fireball among others. Which again, strikes towards the portfolio theory and building up a brand reputation with the specialization of jobs.

WoTC makes new product that interacts with older product, thus allowing the secondary market access to new pieces as well as offering up other services such as tournaments and article services. This is no different than WotC building up the Grand Prix and other such points as the government "building roads and creating the laws," while the "private sector" creating a secondary market for used goods as well as acting as distributors to primary materials, similar to the media to the President as one example.

The market relationships are much more of a complex ecosystem when we have to consider reprints, that allowing access to some reprints builds up a reputation for specific old cards which then allows the market to derive it's own prices overtime. The Walrasian assumptions about commodity prices such as gold are also flawed, in that they fluctuate and do indeed crash whenever someone overly manipulates the market. Now whether SCG and others such as them are the modern day "Jay Gould" and "James Frisk" is up to debate, but they aren't actively seeking a monopoly on all cards. I believe there's quite a bit of secondary market manipulation like you see with the stock market, as some being okay but too much can kill a format.

Which is why whenever you consider some of the larger online stores were invited to talk about the reserve list, which it seemed some of the big secondary retailers were actually against the way the current list is structure in that there is no way that the cards can ever be reprinted. This is why you see as the "Vintage problem," in that stores such as SCG cannot do as many Vintage tournaments as say Modern or Legacy since the Power Nine is set at such a high reprint phase it is ridiculous to consider.

We must also consider aesthetic tastes among others, take for example Nicol Bolas. If you note on TCG player that there are different versions ranging from $1 to $40 dependent upon each version. So these sorts of situations you see aesthetics for foils maintain values over the worst reprint mistake in Magic with Chronicles.

Look at entry cost into a given market and also increasing the amount of competition for secondary market. While not everyone with a Comic Store is going to have the ability to become the next SGC, raising the entry cost too high restricts the amount of new players as well as people entering the secondary market to buy staples. Right now the goal of WotC has been to increase the amount of staples by a stable amount not to crash the market without having to be scared of making a new Reserved List because something just became popular.

The "market forces" having more secondary market competitions being able to enter by buying "cheap goods" and taking over disgruntled secondary marketers who got "burned by a bad market" and had to "eat a loss" allows for new companies to come into existence. Which is creative destruction. Not all massive undulations are good that shatter confidence like a banking panic akin to Chronicles. When we see Modern Masters, this set, and so forth it creates market discipline to secondary market retailers that you have to diversify your business and services enough to keep maintaining loss.

Equally, whenever considering retail is one of the lowest margins in business with the highest competition we must also look at would be merchants and be very honest with them; caveat emptor.

The biggest area to look at really is creating new formats like Commander, Cube, and so forth that develop a large following. Again, founders/Godfathers like Sheldon Menery are actually what counter balances the reprint issue to which is why SGC has him writing for them. Basically by having a multiplayer format like EDH increases player retention for the game and makes longer term customers for secondary market retailers. No different than KFC having Colonel Sanders being the mascot after he built the business himself. Sheldon Menery is EDH as Col. Sanders is KFC.

So yea, comparing this to currency is patently myopic. Cards are a finished product, like cars or dolls. Some you have Malibu Barbie worth $30k (Black Lotus), others have Lamborghinis (FTV sets), and for others you have pauper formats and the existence of commons. Equally, just as "remakes" of "classic Barbies" are sold and are worth less than the original does not make the original worthless nor the remakes worthless. It means just as in the case of Nicol Bolas, that the FTV is Bolas the Ferrari, Chronicles Bolas is Bolas the rusted out 1960's Bug, while the original Legends Bolas is Bolas the Original and people like originals. If a business is taking hit with reprints, the owner may have to rethink their current business model. And the collectibles market is very, very fickle market and takes a lot of tolerance, entrepreneurialism, and foresight to succeed well.


Hence, why:

Sheldon Menery is Colonel Sanders

Cards=! Currency

WotC doesn't steal from the secondary market, the secondary market is a mutualism for both WotC and other businesses expanding different brands and IP. Altogether, the IP belongs to WotC and they can do as they please since all of these are voluntary market interactions.

I believe we're going to see Shamans, Warriors, Barbarians, and Soldiers as heavily pushed. Ogres seem to be a part of this block as well in red. It looks like goblins and elves may not make it into the set, while pushing human tribal more. The last block had a lot of humans, shamans, warriors, and soldiers. Which would mean that the block would perhaps push that way in regards to tribal. Either way, we'll know come M15 what the major outlook is.

Quote from Temujen

Why is Horsemanship not everyone's first guess? Seriously, let the fetchland thing go. WotC will reprint them all in good time. If banding want such a confusing mechanic it would also be a good guess. Horsemanship and banding would go great with the overall nomad theme (not the dragon theme).

Horsemanship is flying by another name and parasitic.

I can already hear:

"I'll attack for lethal"

"KHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN"

"Counter"

"KHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANNNNNN"

"Wrath'd the board"

"KHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANNNNNNNNNNNN"

"I lost, good game man"

"KHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA.. oh I won? Cool, ya good game sis!"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpGX_If3o14



"if his curse is lifted, then so can mine"

Ob Nixilis lost his spark on Zendikar due to the strange mana and was trapped in Zendikar. The ad seems to show some kind of transference to Garruk from Ob Nixilis. We don't really know what Lilianna traded each of the four demons, either.

The names are:

Warlords of Khanar
Khans of Tarkir
Dragons of Tarkir

"Different block structures"

Looking at the names versus what they've done with Scars of Mirrodin, Ravnicas, Onslaught, Innistad, and Lorwin-Shadowmoore. Everything that was "against" each other was held within that set. Such as Orzhov versus Simic was possible within the set and purposely set each set up with a block. In Return to Ravnica we saw how each of the first two sets introduced the main factions then Dragons Maze let everything come together. Onslaught had all creatures in Legions, they won't do that again. They already did color primacy with Torment, not to be repeated.

So it seems the key is in the names so far. We have the Warlords, the Khans, and the dragons. There are two places, one place is Khanar and the other place is Tarkir.

1. These two places are distinct planes at war with each other
A. each of the sets represents a major faction in an interplanar war

2. Tarkir and Khanar are the same place, in different time places
A. place is conquered by something, they change the name
B. There's a time skip within the block or time travel

3. Tarkir and Khanar are just distinct places within the same plane taking place at a normal time span
A. Each set represents a faction versus another faction, depicting the conflict from a different perspective


My assumption whether Tarkir or Khanar are two separate places or planes, we can surmise that Khanar and Tarkir will be thematically different from each other in order to express that they are indeed two different places with entirely different cultures and the like. Which means that:

A. Tarkir will have 5 unique dual color lands attributed to it, Khanar will also have 5 dual colors attributed to it. This has been confirmed with Theros block structure and 2014.
B. Potentially how diverse of an area Asia is that we may see all the fetchlands return.
C. Since Shards block, there has been attempts at small "mini designs" like the Shard pods for developers. So they will probably return to this structure again for Khanar vs. Tarkir
D. Speed vs. Cunning is the dual deck, which probably represents Khanar vs. Tarkir or Tarkir vs. Khanar. So we can presume when it comes "mass battles" that one side will represent "cunning" and the other will represent "speed" and therefore we can presume:

Cunning-Blue

Speed-Red

So one side is going to be heavily focused on using intelligence to fight, while the other will behave like like.. the zerg.

Which brings up an excellent point on theorycrafting. What if they designed an embattled world based on Starcraft and other RTSes?

Meaning that:

Dragons=Protoss=?
Warlords=Zerg=Speed
Khans=Humans=Cunning

So that the dragons are wisdom/slow build up as a military. While the Khans are based on "Cunning" in the Cunning versus and would be more blue aligned. While the Warlords are heavily based on Barbarians and based on Speed in the versus deck. So that would be mean that the Vs. deck is Khans vs. Warlords.

This would also support the home plane of Sarkhan Vol, hence "Sar-khan."

Quote from MTG SALVATION Wiki[/quote »

Early on in his life, Sarkhan was a soldier, but sought something more than the life of an expendable pawn. He joined a clan of shamans, where he found some level of peace, but quickly grew bitter because of the futility of worshiping a nigh-extinct beast. When he returned to his warrior life, he quickly rose in position and power until he came to claim the title of general to his warlord's army. Upon his first expedition, he was touched by an ancient dragon spirit in a trance after having slain the opposing commander. Sacrificing his own men, he unleashed a massive spell that wiped the battlefield clean as he ascended, channeling the power of the spirit he'd connected to. This was to be his first and last battle as a general, as he was stripped of his position, leaving no connection left to bind him to that plane.

Okay look at the bolded part, his life cycle was:

1. Soldier who was an "expendable pawn." This means that the warlords have soldiers and are Speed based in order to conquer other clans. And the use of the word clan infers Mongolian themed plane.

2. He became a shaman, which connects to Theros' heavy use of shamans.

3. "Near-extinct beast" and he is the dragon 'walker. Therefore dragons of Tarkir are still alive, but almost extinct and the ones that remain are very powerful (legendary, think Avacyn Restored angel cycle).

4. He returned to his old life, and became general to a warlord. There are warlords in Khanar.

Which again reinforces Warlords are the Zerg, the Khans are the humans with advancing technology and intelligence and adaptation, and the dragons are the Protoss as a specie that has great power and technology but very old.

It's confusing but that's taking into account the names of the block, Speed vs. Cunning, and Sarkhan Vol's autobiography.

Define your budget, color appeal, and what really goes well with your fancy. Do you want combo interactions? Do you like tribal? Do you want to play Punisher?

Grixis punisher with constellation effects and pain pain effects is one possibility with cards like Phyrexian Tyranny
A rainbow God tribal that focuses on enchantments is good, but rather expensive.
Zedruu is group hug or some freaky trickster deck.
Green/White enchantress offers some advantages from older and newer cards

A good question is one of budget, your typical temperament, and what cards you have access to.

Helping Nigeria against a global slave trade is more than fair, because some of those slaves find themselves in places such as the US, Canada, Europe, and Russia. It stops from their human trafficking profitability to become more of a global trend by developing better tactics to fight the supply chains. The difference between drugs is that they can be hidden, humans on the other hand are very difficult to hide sometimes and are more of a liability. You can't eat a woman and act as a "coke mule," she has to come willingly or be in a state of fear to do so. These are young girls who more pliable than some of the Eastern European and Russian sex slaves who tend to be late teens to early 30's, whose only problem comes down to a trust in police and a language barriers. For the Nigerian children, they're children and have a language barrier. Both of which places them into extreme harm.

We also have a domestic slave trade issue, and I agree that the number of dollars spent to help the Nigerians should be prioritized to help out the domestic slaves, but as said before some of these slaves are global. So this complicates the matter, not only ethnically but thinking in terms of criminal prosecution and other such mechanics for having international norms and laws to deal with the problem. These acts of goodwill do benefit us as we are able to discuss global trends in the fight against slavery and train other nations to deal with their own slave trades more effectively. We have some better policing strategies and COIN strategies that can and do help better. The point is that we're not doing it "for the Nigerians," rather "with" the Nigerians. Which is leagues difference when the one day whenever the Nigerians and some of the larger geostrategic partnerships in the region align themselves together to spread training to other African states facing this threat.

Equally, Boko Haram is basically against western education. As a person who supports western education and has benefited from it, I am naturally against Boko Haram and many Al Qaeda franchisees. These franchisees aren't as harmless as too many McDonalds, as you can't avoid them. This also makes it more difficult for humanitarian aid workers and business people who happen to be women from working safely in those areas of the work as we try to spread the positive effects of good business globally rather than stomping mudholes in peoples' chests.

The question is how to mitigate abortions by asking why people abort people. The direct cause is a financial situation, for young women of college age they believe in delayed gratification and abort early. While poorer women will keep their first two and abort usually after 2-3 children because they value children more highly than their college educated peers. So if we tie down towards two different trends with women abortion with one singular cause, then we must approach the issue from an economic perspective as well as an issue with the adoption industry in the US.

The taboo over different races adopting children of different ethnic backgrounds is one area that can be addressed culturally. The other direction is to look at getting people out of college faster with less debt so they do not feel the pressure to abort, while those in lower economic situations to be able to have upward mobility to keep more of their own progeny. Yet, we must look at the Malthusian problem in that regard to comprehend population explosion and the limited nature of our current resources with the population bubble we have during the Age of Oil. As a nation, the US is at zero population growth and has encountered a rising amount of seniors as well as a baby bust during the economic recession. We only have a positive population growth because of immigration.

So when looking for a policy answer, we have to ask wider questions on women employment, family wages, technology, marrying age, adoption system, methods of getting pregnant, and on and on. Rather than looking at a policy towards abortion, looking at a childbearing policy that is pro family and pro child is necessary to compute over that of just singularly abortion.

Quote from xecel »

sorry, I have not heard the word heterosexual used often, especially not used to describe a particular person (I am speaking from personal experienced)

You've not heard someone referred to as being heterosexual?

I am not quite sure why I feel uncomfortable, but I think that it feels unnatural and weird to me.

There are few things less unnatural and weird than heterosexuality.

It goes back to the idea of it feeling clinical.

Except you said that you feel uncomfortable with the word "straight" also, which is neither clinical nor uncommon.