You are both right and I know this. However, since Ghitu Encampment comes into play tapped, in order for it to block during its first turn after you play it you have to untap it with some outside effect. Summoning sickness also matters if you take control of the encampment with something like Annex rather than playing it, but that's even more complicated. I thought explaining those possibilities wasn't necessary for answering DisturbedZen's question. But thanks for bringing it up anyway, that's just more stuff for him and other readers to discover.
1) No. You can't respond to mana abilties, or even to any costs for activated abilities, mana or not. You cannot prevent an ability from going on the stack or resolving by removing its source in response. And yes, he can use his land's ability in response to Fulminator Mage's ability.
2) No. If the blockers have been declared, then your 4/4 is considered blocked for the rest of combat even if you remove the blocker before damage, and it can't deal damage to your opponent unless it has trample.
3) A Ghitu Encampment that's been turned into a creature retains its ability to produce red mana, so yes it's legal.
Oh and btw, i love how wizards says that pre-release was a sucess, but they don't mention that the release party was an epic FAIL. The store i usually go for had 12 people were at eventide and shadowmoor, it had 33-36 people. Maybe money was the issue, maybe it was the repeated ajanis, but release party was terrible. Something is going to change one way or the other...
We can't know for sure how much of a failure it actually was, but I tend to think the same way, and the factors you mentionned sure contributed in that failure. But you forgot one major factor, perhaps the biggest : the Theme Tournament format, which was the main format for the Launch parties. For those who don't know, it was basically a sealed deck tournament, except that you could only play cards in the three colors of a shard of your choice, and your mana sources that would produce mana of any other color produced colorless mana instead. That format was an inhenrently flawed idea : sealed deck is already the most luck-based format, and this version makes it so that you can compete only if you open a pool that's concentrated enough in one shard. That format blew so much that I suspect many TO's actually held a true unrestricted sealed deck tournament instead and reported it to the DCI as if it was a Theme Tournament. There weren't any Launch Parties in my parts, instead the two major shops each held a prerelease on Saturday and Sunday, respectively, so I didn't have to face the choice of playing that format or not, but if I'd knew there was gonna be a Launch party of the Theme Tournament format, I wouldn't have gone. I told that in my final comments for the survey.
Thank you for these 3 years of entertaining rules teaching, Doc ! And good luck in your future projects. I'm eager to see what the new CI authors can do, they who, unlike me (:(), were bright enough to fully read the cards and the rules involved when completing the application test.
Q: I put together an updated version of the old Trix combo for MTGO. Just tried playing it again today since the last update, and when I exchanged control of the Illusions of Grandeur and neglected to pay the upkeep, the game made me lose 20 life, even though it was leaving play from my opponent's side of the board. Which way is correct according to real Magic rules, and not some silly MTGO bugs?
A: Whoever controls Illusions of Grandeur when it leaves play is the one to lose the 20 life. Since your opponent controlled it in this case, he should have lost the life. It looks like this is a bug, and you should report it thru the software’s reporting client.
This question intrigues me quite a bit. Donate doesn't exist on MTGO yet, so I'm assuming the card used to do the "trix" here is Puca's Mischief. The thing is that, with these two cards involved, I fail to see how you neglecting to pay for Cumulative Upkeep can end up in Illusions of Grandeur leaving play under your opponent's control.
Here's what should happen if I understand correctly :
1) You control both Illusions of Grandeur and Puca's Mischief at the beginning of your upkeep, so Cumulative Upkeep and the Mischief's ability both trigger. Since you don't want to pay for Cumulative Upkeep or sacrifice the Illusions before your opponent gains control of them, you most likely put Mischief's ability on top of the stack for it to resolve first. You target Illusions of Grandeur and any of her non-land permanents with CMC 4 or less.
2) Puca's Mischief's trigger resolves. You exchange control of Illusions of Grandeur and the other permanent.
3) Cumulative Upkeep resolves. Note that you still control the ability even tough its source has changed controller. You put an age counter on Illusions of Grandeur, because the change of controller doesn't prevent that action. Then you choose to either pay 2 for each age counter on them, or to sacrifice them. If you choose to sacrifice Illusions of Grandeur, then nothing should happen and they should remain in play, because you can't sacrifice a permanent that you don't control.
That's why what happened doesn't make sense as described. I see three possibilities to explain that :
1. The person asking the question didn't word it right : he meant that he lost the life instead of his opponent when she sacrified Illusions of Grandeur on one of her upkeeps later in the game. A bug on MTGO caused the trigger from Illusions of Grandeur to go on the stack under his control.
2. The rule that forbids a player from sacrificing a permanent he or she doesn't control isn't programmed right in MTGO and, somehow, sacrificing a permanent one owns but doesn't control causes any abilities triggered by that sacrifice to go on the stack under one's control. If that's the case, I say WOW to MTGO programmers. Very unlikely IMO.
3. The person asking the question actually didn't stack the two triggers right, and Cumulative Upkeep resolved first. He neglected to pay for it, somehow thinking that Illusions of Grandeur was already under his opponent's control, and correctly lost 20 life. Thus, it wasn't a MTGO bug at all.
The more I think about it, the more I think number 3 is the most likely explanation, followed by number 1. Any thoughts ?
Nice article ! It strikes me how your evolution as a player and your love affair with the fish-men ressembles mine. My first "serious" deck was also old-school merfolk aggro, and it also was my brother, who taught me how to play and had built Merfolk before me, who helped me make it. When Lorwyn was released, I too built UW Merfolk, however I stopped playing it after only a few weeks, because I had other decks ideas to test; I tend to never play the same deck in Standard for more than 2-3 weeks. And now I'm playing monoblue Merfolk in Vintage (it's not tier 1 by any means, but it has cool things going for it and does well enough for my tastes).
About your list : honestly, I didn't think the Standard rotation would leave UW Merfolk alive, since the deck lost both Lord of Atlantis and Rune Snag and didn't gain anything with Shards. I realize now that it is still very potent, and that building around Wake Thrasher is the way to go ! I never thought about the trick of using Mutavault and Sygg as mana sinks to pump it (which shows I have actually never played or faced it). That's very interesting.
I thought that if a Merfolk deck was gonna take a spot in the new meta, it would be something like the UG build with Chameleon Colossus that was played in Block, but that one I didn't hear about yet. Speaking of Block, I realized while looking at your list that it is very close to 100% Block (only Ardarkar Wastes, that you can live without, and Hindering Light in the board, that you didn't like, aren't in the format) and that makes me wonder if UW Merfolk could have been a contender there. It's all very hypothetical as the format is pretty much dead now, but it's still food for thought. Any opinions ?
I can't help but note that you didn't face any five-color control deck (Cruel Control or otherwise) during the tournament, while that archetype kinda is the one to beat right now. I wonder how you would do against it, with its pletora of removal, board sweepers and fitting counterspells such as Remove Soul. You sure have tools against it, though, and I don't believe it would be a blowout. Did you test that matchup at all ? If it's a tough one, I would strongly suggest trying Glen Elendra Archmage in the board. It shuts down most of the problematic spells, including board sweepers and Cruel Ultimatum. While it's not a merfolk, like Sower it's a wizard for the Banneret; that cost reduction makes it much easier for you to play it while keeping U open for the ability.
The possibility of reprints as Mythic rares in 11th creates some complicated issues, and that makes me wonder if they'll actually do it. Reprinting cards while changing their rarity so drastically could mess up the secondary market too much IMO... But then again, Mythic was presented as a permanent, evergreen fixture, so it would also feel weird if they didn't do it. If they do, the only cycle that seems a given is the five Lorwyn planeswalkers. Other than that, we can keep guessing for a long time and always be wrong.
About Grim Tutor and Force of Will : I'm convinced these two Vintage staples will not be reprinted, but interestingly enough, for completely different reasons.
Mechanically speaking, Grim Tutor is a perfectly reasonable and fair tutor to print. Without the 3 life drawback, it would be a bit too good, but with it, it is just better enough than Diabolic Tutor for it to become the staple that the latter wishes it could be. Then what's the problem ? The secondary market value, of course. Even if printed at Mythic (which is impossible for the reasons Maro stated), Grim Tutor would experience a huge drop in value due to a huge bump in availability, something like -100$, and that would rightfully drive all Vintage players who spent 500+ bucks to get their playset incredibly mad. Yes, they've already reprinted classics like Psionic Blast, Underworld Dreams, and (kinda) Juzam Djinn, but those weren't seeing any play in Vintage and/or were stabilized at a reasonable secondary market value, comparable to recent chase rares'.
Force of Will, on the other hand, doesn't really present the same secondary market value problem. If printed as a normal rare in a core set, its value would probably be approximatively the same as it is now (25-30 $). If printed as a Mythic (again very unlikely for the same reasons as GT), then it would certainly go up due to the growth of the demand for Standard and Extended having a greater effect than the added availability, but that wouldn't be dramatic. But the problem is, of course, what wasn't a problem for GT : FoW is grossly overpowered. Blue is still the best color even in newer formats; it doesn't need such a ridiculous tool. They didn't remove all two-mana hard-counters from Standard and Extended just to reprint a *&$#)(_&)0-mana one.
Great article overall. I especially liked the fact that you listed the keywords that imply the word "target"; most of the time, when people answer to the question "what does target", they just say "cards that have the word target printed on them and aura spells on the stack" while omitting those abilities. One could say that having one of those keywords printed on the card is the same as having the actual word "target" printed on the card, and so that the answer is technically correct, but when your goal is to teach as much as possible, mentionning those keywords is very relevant.
On the other hand, I think you should have included more details on auras, even dedicating a whole section to their targeting issues. I don't see anywhere in the text that aura spells on the stack target, and that auras put directly into play don't. These are important info indeed; one can deduce those facts from the rest of the article, especially the sentences where you include enchant among other keywords, but enchant is enough of a special case for me to think it would have been important to spell its particular targeting implications clearly and separately from keywords.
Very good article. It sums up the basic implications of the rotation quite well.
I strongly believe RGW Zoo will be the non-linear (non-goblin, non-affinity) aggro deck of choice in the new format. Domain Zoo (GMGT) loses too much of what made it worthwhile, and straight RGW gains too much thanks to Naya. We've seen only Wild Nacatl and Woolly Thoctar so far, the first being an automatic four-of and the second a very strong contender, and these two only would be enough, but who knows what else Naya has to offer to the archetype ? Just the possibility of turn one Nacatl, turn two Watchwolf, turn three Thoctar makes me salivate.
Also, I suspect the combo decks that will arise will be those that were good in post-Onslaught standard formats, aka UG Heartbeat and UR Dragonstorm, because these are still pretty whole, and they don't rely at all on cards from Invasion and Odyssey blocks. Sure, Cunning Wish would be nice in Heartbeat and Burning Wish would be good in DStorm, but they can easily function without them, a lot moreso than TEPS at the very least. Gigadrowse and the more recent Pact of Negation shall act as nice anti-counterspell protection.
I told him Conspire is an additionnal cost and thus has to be paid before Cinder Pyromancer/Nettle Sentinel's triggered ability resolves. He doesn't believe me and thinks that works because of some ruling he saw in these forums or in Cranial Insertion... I'm not accusing MTGSalvation judges of giving bad rulings; my belief is that he actually misinterpreted the ruling/question he read. I might also be wrong, but I'm fairly certain I'm not.
UNIMPORTANT NOTICE: The Urchin will be relocating in two weeks time to Portland, Oregon. If any of you are players out there and happen to spot a dark-haired girl judge with glasses (who is not short), introduce yourself!
By the way, sorry for calling you short. I'm jealous of Portland players; they are very lucky to have you coming their way, and I'm sure they will be quick to see how big of a judge you are (if not literally, at least figuratively ;)).
Fun game for long car rides: next time you’re driving to a PTQ or a Prerelease, see how many non-basic lands you can think of that are amusing when used as euphemisms for a certain part of the female anatomy.
Sorry if any of this looks above PG-13.... I have no idea which one Lewa Arkhan found, because his post was edited before I could read it, so if it's one of these, doubly sorry. It's just so funny.
I was reading the comments on that site and some of them are so awful.
The husband was obviously disturbed. Comments such as "Why didn't he skip the murder and just go to suicide?" are completely inappropriate. He needed help, not death.
I agree with you that he shouldn't have died, but for a whole other reason. I don't think he needed help; I think he needed to suffer greatly for years to pay for his verbal, physical and most likely sexual abuse over Melissa.
Of course, he probably became like that because he himself was abused by his family during his childhood. But hey, no one is born evil, and it's almost always the way it happens. It doesn't mean people like him are forgiveable, or that they can change.
To me, no people are more hateable than those who consciously hurt the ones they are supposed to love. I don't believe in Hell, but I wish there was a Hell for these people.
Rest in peace, Melissa. I only hope you're not in the same place as him.
Urchin's up in Canadia, and I'm sure she'll have plenty of stories for us next week. As for now, we're going to dive into the mailbag and-
I assume Canadia is a typo and it should be Canada, which means I actually saw Urchin at Canadian Nationals in Montreal this weekend without knowing it ! Since there was only one female judge at the event and I was intrigued by her, I can remember what she looks like : short, black-haired and wearing glasses, but I had no idea who she was at the time. If I'd knew, I would certainly would have told her in person how much I like her CI articles, especially that special touch of humor she puts in them !
A: Briefly. It lives long enough to think, “Hey, that other guy died. This probably isn’t good for AUUUGH THE BURNING!” Once the Safehold Elite dies, the +1/+1 bonus the Cohort enjoys disappears. At that point, it's a 2/2 with 2 damage on it, so it will die also.
While the answer is perfectly correct, I feel it may have been worth it to add a note about why Safehold Elite's persist doesn't matter here, because I think that's what, in part, the person asking the question was wondering.
Here's what happens in more detail, if anyone's interested (well I'm pretty sure that's what happens, please correct me if I'm wrong) :
Pyroclasm resolves. Then state-based effects are checked before the active player gains priority, and Safehold Elite is destroyed by lethal damage. Ballynock Cohort immediatly reverts back to 2/2. At that point, Persist triggers, but it can't go on the stack yet, because before that, state-based effects must be checked again (SBEs are checked repeatedly until no new one applies), see a 2/2 Ballyknock Cohort with 2 damage on it and have it destroyed. It is only after that Persist goes on the stack, so when it resolves and the Elite comes back, it is way too late to save the Cohort.
Good article. I always find it interesting to read the thoughts of an other player preparing for a tournament, no matter if he's an international pro or not.
Little nitpicking : the monored deck you were considering to play is NOT a Burn deck (in the archetype sense of the word), it's a version of Red Deck Wins. I know it's only terminology, but I felt like pointing this out because my own Standard monored deck, that I planned on playing at regionals (but finally didn't attend), is what I call a real burn deck. To me, a burn deck is one that ignores blockers and removal as much as possible and systematically sends its fire to the dome. The only creatures of a true burn deck are ones that act like burn, namely Keldon Marauders and Mogg Fanatic in current Standard. That archetype is the real home for Browbeat, which is worthwile only if almost all your non-land cards are reach.
No matter the name you give to it, your monored deck nevertheless presents interesting card choices that I'll keep in mind. I like Keldon Megaliths especially; it seems it would be an even better fit for my Burn deck, which drops its hand quickly and wants to push damage while ignoring blockers. I am playing Mutavault and Ghitu Encampment in my current version, and I must admit it can be hard to get much damage out of them since I generally don't want to use my burn on blockers. I already briefly considered the Megaliths, but never tested them, and you make me feel like trying.
Some thoughts on red beatdown decks VS decks with Dark Confidant :
This is a very interesting issue. Usually, I think the decision of killing Bob or not comes down to how early in the game it is. If that Bob is played turn 2-3, always burn him out, because then the player has enough life to safely get a lot of card advantage, and you don't want that. Depending on the deck, that CA will quite possibly give him control over you and allow him to stabilize, or outrace you if he's any lucky to draw more good aggro cards than you while not losing much life. If the Bob gets played later, when the player is already under 15, then it depends if you think what you have in hand and on the board is enough to finish the guy with a little help from Bob, and it is quite often the right decision to let him live. However, in a matchup where the Bob player also is red aggro, I think you need to kill Bob a little more often and up to a little later in the game, because it's a race, and Bob can easily win aggro races trough double fuel.
Anyway, a red beatdown deck always has the upper hand against Bob. The red player can usually either kill Bob right away for as much mana or less than he costs, or let him live for him to kill his controller, depending on the situation. Giving such a fun choice to your opponent is never a good thing, and that's why I always side out Bob against red. That RGb player should have, IMO. He sure was lucky, but you should have killed his Bob, too, if you ask me.
2) No. If the blockers have been declared, then your 4/4 is considered blocked for the rest of combat even if you remove the blocker before damage, and it can't deal damage to your opponent unless it has trample.
3) A Ghitu Encampment that's been turned into a creature retains its ability to produce red mana, so yes it's legal.
EDIT : card tags.
We can't know for sure how much of a failure it actually was, but I tend to think the same way, and the factors you mentionned sure contributed in that failure. But you forgot one major factor, perhaps the biggest : the Theme Tournament format, which was the main format for the Launch parties. For those who don't know, it was basically a sealed deck tournament, except that you could only play cards in the three colors of a shard of your choice, and your mana sources that would produce mana of any other color produced colorless mana instead. That format was an inhenrently flawed idea : sealed deck is already the most luck-based format, and this version makes it so that you can compete only if you open a pool that's concentrated enough in one shard. That format blew so much that I suspect many TO's actually held a true unrestricted sealed deck tournament instead and reported it to the DCI as if it was a Theme Tournament. There weren't any Launch Parties in my parts, instead the two major shops each held a prerelease on Saturday and Sunday, respectively, so I didn't have to face the choice of playing that format or not, but if I'd knew there was gonna be a Launch party of the Theme Tournament format, I wouldn't have gone. I told that in my final comments for the survey.
This question intrigues me quite a bit. Donate doesn't exist on MTGO yet, so I'm assuming the card used to do the "trix" here is Puca's Mischief. The thing is that, with these two cards involved, I fail to see how you neglecting to pay for Cumulative Upkeep can end up in Illusions of Grandeur leaving play under your opponent's control.
Here's what should happen if I understand correctly :
1) You control both Illusions of Grandeur and Puca's Mischief at the beginning of your upkeep, so Cumulative Upkeep and the Mischief's ability both trigger. Since you don't want to pay for Cumulative Upkeep or sacrifice the Illusions before your opponent gains control of them, you most likely put Mischief's ability on top of the stack for it to resolve first. You target Illusions of Grandeur and any of her non-land permanents with CMC 4 or less.
2) Puca's Mischief's trigger resolves. You exchange control of Illusions of Grandeur and the other permanent.
3) Cumulative Upkeep resolves. Note that you still control the ability even tough its source has changed controller. You put an age counter on Illusions of Grandeur, because the change of controller doesn't prevent that action. Then you choose to either pay 2 for each age counter on them, or to sacrifice them. If you choose to sacrifice Illusions of Grandeur, then nothing should happen and they should remain in play, because you can't sacrifice a permanent that you don't control.
That's why what happened doesn't make sense as described. I see three possibilities to explain that :
1. The person asking the question didn't word it right : he meant that he lost the life instead of his opponent when she sacrified Illusions of Grandeur on one of her upkeeps later in the game. A bug on MTGO caused the trigger from Illusions of Grandeur to go on the stack under his control.
2. The rule that forbids a player from sacrificing a permanent he or she doesn't control isn't programmed right in MTGO and, somehow, sacrificing a permanent one owns but doesn't control causes any abilities triggered by that sacrifice to go on the stack under one's control. If that's the case, I say WOW to MTGO programmers. Very unlikely IMO.
3. The person asking the question actually didn't stack the two triggers right, and Cumulative Upkeep resolved first. He neglected to pay for it, somehow thinking that Illusions of Grandeur was already under his opponent's control, and correctly lost 20 life. Thus, it wasn't a MTGO bug at all.
The more I think about it, the more I think number 3 is the most likely explanation, followed by number 1. Any thoughts ?
About your list : honestly, I didn't think the Standard rotation would leave UW Merfolk alive, since the deck lost both Lord of Atlantis and Rune Snag and didn't gain anything with Shards. I realize now that it is still very potent, and that building around Wake Thrasher is the way to go ! I never thought about the trick of using Mutavault and Sygg as mana sinks to pump it (which shows I have actually never played or faced it). That's very interesting.
I thought that if a Merfolk deck was gonna take a spot in the new meta, it would be something like the UG build with Chameleon Colossus that was played in Block, but that one I didn't hear about yet. Speaking of Block, I realized while looking at your list that it is very close to 100% Block (only Ardarkar Wastes, that you can live without, and Hindering Light in the board, that you didn't like, aren't in the format) and that makes me wonder if UW Merfolk could have been a contender there. It's all very hypothetical as the format is pretty much dead now, but it's still food for thought. Any opinions ?
I can't help but note that you didn't face any five-color control deck (Cruel Control or otherwise) during the tournament, while that archetype kinda is the one to beat right now. I wonder how you would do against it, with its pletora of removal, board sweepers and fitting counterspells such as Remove Soul. You sure have tools against it, though, and I don't believe it would be a blowout. Did you test that matchup at all ? If it's a tough one, I would strongly suggest trying Glen Elendra Archmage in the board. It shuts down most of the problematic spells, including board sweepers and Cruel Ultimatum. While it's not a merfolk, like Sower it's a wizard for the Banneret; that cost reduction makes it much easier for you to play it while keeping U open for the ability.
About Grim Tutor and Force of Will : I'm convinced these two Vintage staples will not be reprinted, but interestingly enough, for completely different reasons.
Mechanically speaking, Grim Tutor is a perfectly reasonable and fair tutor to print. Without the 3 life drawback, it would be a bit too good, but with it, it is just better enough than Diabolic Tutor for it to become the staple that the latter wishes it could be. Then what's the problem ? The secondary market value, of course. Even if printed at Mythic (which is impossible for the reasons Maro stated), Grim Tutor would experience a huge drop in value due to a huge bump in availability, something like -100$, and that would rightfully drive all Vintage players who spent 500+ bucks to get their playset incredibly mad. Yes, they've already reprinted classics like Psionic Blast, Underworld Dreams, and (kinda) Juzam Djinn, but those weren't seeing any play in Vintage and/or were stabilized at a reasonable secondary market value, comparable to recent chase rares'.
Force of Will, on the other hand, doesn't really present the same secondary market value problem. If printed as a normal rare in a core set, its value would probably be approximatively the same as it is now (25-30 $). If printed as a Mythic (again very unlikely for the same reasons as GT), then it would certainly go up due to the growth of the demand for Standard and Extended having a greater effect than the added availability, but that wouldn't be dramatic. But the problem is, of course, what wasn't a problem for GT : FoW is grossly overpowered. Blue is still the best color even in newer formats; it doesn't need such a ridiculous tool. They didn't remove all two-mana hard-counters from Standard and Extended just to reprint a *&$#)(_&)0-mana one.
On the other hand, I think you should have included more details on auras, even dedicating a whole section to their targeting issues. I don't see anywhere in the text that aura spells on the stack target, and that auras put directly into play don't. These are important info indeed; one can deduce those facts from the rest of the article, especially the sentences where you include enchant among other keywords, but enchant is enough of a special case for me to think it would have been important to spell its particular targeting implications clearly and separately from keywords.
I strongly believe RGW Zoo will be the non-linear (non-goblin, non-affinity) aggro deck of choice in the new format. Domain Zoo (GMGT) loses too much of what made it worthwhile, and straight RGW gains too much thanks to Naya. We've seen only Wild Nacatl and Woolly Thoctar so far, the first being an automatic four-of and the second a very strong contender, and these two only would be enough, but who knows what else Naya has to offer to the archetype ? Just the possibility of turn one Nacatl, turn two Watchwolf, turn three Thoctar makes me salivate.
Also, I suspect the combo decks that will arise will be those that were good in post-Onslaught standard formats, aka UG Heartbeat and UR Dragonstorm, because these are still pretty whole, and they don't rely at all on cards from Invasion and Odyssey blocks. Sure, Cunning Wish would be nice in Heartbeat and Burning Wish would be good in DStorm, but they can easily function without them, a lot moreso than TEPS at the very least. Gigadrowse and the more recent Pact of Negation shall act as nice anti-counterspell protection.
If you control a tapped Nettle Sentinel and one other green creature, can you conspire Gleeful Sabotage ?
Same thing with Cinder Pyromancer and a red conspire spell like Burn Trail.
I told him Conspire is an additionnal cost and thus has to be paid before Cinder Pyromancer/Nettle Sentinel's triggered ability resolves. He doesn't believe me and thinks that works because of some ruling he saw in these forums or in Cranial Insertion... I'm not accusing MTGSalvation judges of giving bad rulings; my belief is that he actually misinterpreted the ruling/question he read. I might also be wrong, but I'm fairly certain I'm not.
Strange, I have a feeling that some post from last week's CI tread has helped inspire that notice...
By the way, sorry for calling you short. I'm jealous of Portland players; they are very lucky to have you coming their way, and I'm sure they will be quick to see how big of a judge you are (if not literally, at least figuratively ;)).
Some fitting ones :
Breeding Pool.
For a girl who has several guys fighting for her : Contested Cliffs
Dark Depths
Mystic Gate
And my favorite : Miren, The Moaning Well
Sorry if any of this looks above PG-13.... I have no idea which one Lewa Arkhan found, because his post was edited before I could read it, so if it's one of these, doubly sorry. It's just so funny.
I agree with you that he shouldn't have died, but for a whole other reason. I don't think he needed help; I think he needed to suffer greatly for years to pay for his verbal, physical and most likely sexual abuse over Melissa.
Of course, he probably became like that because he himself was abused by his family during his childhood. But hey, no one is born evil, and it's almost always the way it happens. It doesn't mean people like him are forgiveable, or that they can change.
To me, no people are more hateable than those who consciously hurt the ones they are supposed to love. I don't believe in Hell, but I wish there was a Hell for these people.
Rest in peace, Melissa. I only hope you're not in the same place as him.
I assume Canadia is a typo and it should be Canada, which means I actually saw Urchin at Canadian Nationals in Montreal this weekend without knowing it ! Since there was only one female judge at the event and I was intrigued by her, I can remember what she looks like : short, black-haired and wearing glasses, but I had no idea who she was at the time. If I'd knew, I would certainly would have told her in person how much I like her CI articles, especially that special touch of humor she puts in them !
While the answer is perfectly correct, I feel it may have been worth it to add a note about why Safehold Elite's persist doesn't matter here, because I think that's what, in part, the person asking the question was wondering.
Here's what happens in more detail, if anyone's interested (well I'm pretty sure that's what happens, please correct me if I'm wrong) :
Pyroclasm resolves. Then state-based effects are checked before the active player gains priority, and Safehold Elite is destroyed by lethal damage. Ballynock Cohort immediatly reverts back to 2/2. At that point, Persist triggers, but it can't go on the stack yet, because before that, state-based effects must be checked again (SBEs are checked repeatedly until no new one applies), see a 2/2 Ballyknock Cohort with 2 damage on it and have it destroyed. It is only after that Persist goes on the stack, so when it resolves and the Elite comes back, it is way too late to save the Cohort.
Little nitpicking : the monored deck you were considering to play is NOT a Burn deck (in the archetype sense of the word), it's a version of Red Deck Wins. I know it's only terminology, but I felt like pointing this out because my own Standard monored deck, that I planned on playing at regionals (but finally didn't attend), is what I call a real burn deck. To me, a burn deck is one that ignores blockers and removal as much as possible and systematically sends its fire to the dome. The only creatures of a true burn deck are ones that act like burn, namely Keldon Marauders and Mogg Fanatic in current Standard. That archetype is the real home for Browbeat, which is worthwile only if almost all your non-land cards are reach.
No matter the name you give to it, your monored deck nevertheless presents interesting card choices that I'll keep in mind. I like Keldon Megaliths especially; it seems it would be an even better fit for my Burn deck, which drops its hand quickly and wants to push damage while ignoring blockers. I am playing Mutavault and Ghitu Encampment in my current version, and I must admit it can be hard to get much damage out of them since I generally don't want to use my burn on blockers. I already briefly considered the Megaliths, but never tested them, and you make me feel like trying.
This is a very interesting issue. Usually, I think the decision of killing Bob or not comes down to how early in the game it is. If that Bob is played turn 2-3, always burn him out, because then the player has enough life to safely get a lot of card advantage, and you don't want that. Depending on the deck, that CA will quite possibly give him control over you and allow him to stabilize, or outrace you if he's any lucky to draw more good aggro cards than you while not losing much life. If the Bob gets played later, when the player is already under 15, then it depends if you think what you have in hand and on the board is enough to finish the guy with a little help from Bob, and it is quite often the right decision to let him live. However, in a matchup where the Bob player also is red aggro, I think you need to kill Bob a little more often and up to a little later in the game, because it's a race, and Bob can easily win aggro races trough double fuel.
Anyway, a red beatdown deck always has the upper hand against Bob. The red player can usually either kill Bob right away for as much mana or less than he costs, or let him live for him to kill his controller, depending on the situation. Giving such a fun choice to your opponent is never a good thing, and that's why I always side out Bob against red. That RGb player should have, IMO. He sure was lucky, but you should have killed his Bob, too, if you ask me.