By creature based ramp, I mean ramp cards that usually are creatures that add mana to your pool directly. The problem with these is that they can be killed and then their ramp effect is gone. Killing lands is also possible but happens a lot less often. Artifact destruction is more frequent than land, but less than creatures.
For example Rampant Growth or Sakura-Tribe Elder. While the latter is a creature, both ramp you the same way, they put a land into play. So that if you play them turn two and hit all your land drops, have four land out turn three.
A Fetch only replaces one land with an other. Lay of the Land's effect is also not ramp, because you will also not get more land onto the table than you can play normally.
With four SotF you have a very potent engien running.
Looks more like you need more Nightmares. Maybe a Pod or two, or switch to Pod alltogether.
I don't like Karador in the list, and neither Gravecrawler. Four clamps might be one too much.
This.
FOW is the glue that holds Legacy together, it gives you a way to stop unfair decks turn 1/2; at the cost of card advantage and 1 life.
I'm going out on a limb here and say that FoW is not as important you say here and lots of people do elsewhere. There's other reasonably cheap 1:1 (Force technically is 1:2, but that's besides the point) answers that would fill the gap atleast good enough. I'm sure there's loads of feedback loops in a counterfactual model, but something says me the changes in win ratios of unfair decks would be small and not be the deciding factor in the resulting meta game change, once it rebalanced itself, but that decks relying on FoW got weaker overall.
Modern has some of its bans because Wizards openly stated they do not want the format to be too fast. It's not (all) about balance. Legacy is what you get when you have balance as #1 priority. In some twisted way this makes sense for Modern, despite the naysayers. Formats need to be different for each to appeal to enough people. There's an example.
Yes, the Modern card pool needs a few extra things to make it more balanced in this sense, but the current methods used to balance the format are poor ones.
Probably not what you ment, but you are right, in that Modern needs a few more things to find a better self-balance that also keeps the speed under the desired limit. The BNG card Spirit of the Labyrinth's most outstanding feature is that it will make an impact in only one format, when two others also could play it. Implying it will not make the cut in Modern or Standard against more relevant options within each. Such cards give me hope that Wizards might manage to hit this good spot again in future sets. Over time often enough to let Modern evolve rather than being bred.
It's nice to see debate on modern and legacy. Too bad I can't participate.
An update to one of my designs; Unexpectedly Absent is the parametric Long-Term Plans effect.
Destiny Chimes
Artifact
As long as you control a legendary permanent, if you would draw a card, instead you may skip that draw. If you do, choose a legendary permanent you control and search your library for a card. Shuffle your library, then put that card into your library just beneath the top X cards of it, where X is the number of other permanents you control that share a card type with that permanent. Then put the top card of your library into your hand. It signals not the call to action, but the surrender of arms, the final concession of the world's will.
It's a dumb card I must say. Heroes' Podium is much better. I'm still mad I didn't submit that other card from the post to YMTC4.
What a wall of words. With Wizards' updated wording atleast its is less of a jawbreaker. Might be too easy to enable off legendary lands, but then there's this balancing factor in that you can't add too many of a given cardtype to a list without potentially watering down the Tutor effect. An elegant feature :), preventing me from coming to a conclusion about this things power. Neat, but potentially dangerous, with incentives to play utility lands. I approve.
I am blown away by how civil this discussion has been.
If this surprises you, you must have mistakenly taken expectations about specific areas of the forum that shall not be named to this place.
That said, im in the process of transitioning an old merfolk deck over to modern just so i can enjoy games with newer players without feeling like im whipping out a bazooka to hunt rabbits.
Artillery shells, cluster bombs and NBC's have proven more effective in rabbit extermination. I also heared German soldiers who had to secure 'Die Mauer' have acquired some competence on the field.
Heroes' Podium is just a watered down Captain Sisay. Better? Maybe, but less interesting.
To me it's like a Coat of Arms just for the creature type Legend. It also has an attached mana sink, that is only worth it in the only kind of deck that will ever play this card. It's also obvious to the point of being displeasing.
What I actually came here for is a question and to end the post another bold hypothesis on blue cards.
First I'd like to know what you think to be the better play. The outline, and I hope I'm precise enough here, is that your opponent has a few creatures that could goldfish in three turns, you also have a three turn clock in one creature (Reckoner, so it won't be blocked). You're at ~24 life, the op. at 9. You play a deck with some direct damage spells (mostly Helixes, that's how you got the life). Your opponent plays green. Opponent is in topdeck mode, you hold a few irrelevant cards. Your opponent attacks for 8.
Now the actual play in question: You can either prevent the damage using utility lands resulting in no change of board position (yes, your opponent attacks into that), or take the damage and cast a Relevation for four. To Maze or to Stroke?
And to end: Gitaxian Probe's information is more valuable than Serum Visions' information.
I exclude the Ps and BS, because their extra over Reach Through Mists is more than just information. If those were excluded, I'd add them, but that's hairy to discuss.
Play efficient creatures with abilities that either happen from entering or leaving the battlefield or that cause them to leave it.
Creatures with cast triggers, allthough those are, I think, and rightfully so, very few. Sakura-Tibe Elder for example ramps Karador twice. On that note: You should also try to cast him for four to six mana. Else you might as well play Sheoldred, Whispering One and get a creature per turn for free plus an Edict engine, on a bigger body - only downside being she's uptight about her schedule and timing might nail you, where Karador is more flexible.
Green is mostly played for Harabaz Druid and giving you a plan B with the more agressive allies in the colours (the two drops and the flier). Turntimber Ranger and some form of type manipulation to either hav him trigger off his tokens or make his tokens trigger him can also go infinite. This also happens to be in BUG colours, and he's not half bad.
Having creature based ramp in a meta full of decks with burn spells... You should play more land based or artifact based ramp. I know that Sage fixes all colours and ramps three, but so should your opponent and shoot them on sight.
If you play Fog effects, don't play those for three mana. Moment's Peace is a thing. Better than Fog effects is spells that gain you life while doing something usefull. F.e. Lightning Helix, probably better against Rakdos than spell based burn, but even if it's a good burn deck, a killing a Vexing Devil means you gained 7 life, sort of.
If you truely want to annoy them play a couple Martyr of Sands. Scrap Sanctifiers. An other option is Story Circle. You could also add more Angels that gain life, over ones that don't.
TaxRack is very good engine for CA, but no ramp. Try and see if you can capitalize on the CA enough to neglect the lack of ramping.
Course is not accel. Unlike Oracle it does not allow you to play more than one land. It 'merely' gives you the ~40% chance of drawing an additional card per turn. And some life... on a solid if tame body.
cut bad cards, added good ones. made the deck more stable.
turn one plays are really not as important as you might think, atleast in a setting where your former deck was not curbstomped by competitive modern/legacy or even vintage decks. ^^ you play black. in your case that means two things. 1) you can kill stuff 2) you have lifegain (the good one that also causes damage or loss of life). Phalanx of the Returned is a much stronger play against an agressive deck than an Asphodel Wanderer. You might take some damage, but the 3/3 will trade a lot better in combat than a 1/1, and the 2B regeneration is steep. Also, Phalanx does not have to be able to attack to be solid. It's an ok bonus if you have scry lands that can actiavte it and Graves that are also Swamps, but it's totaly not needed.
You also might want to look for permanent cards that have more black mana symbols in their cost, so you get higher devotion. it's kind of tricky with theros cards tho, as those were made with devotion in mind. F.e. Agent of the Fates probably is better than Fellhide Minotaur for your deck, even if you disregard its two abilities and the swapped p/t. Nevermind trying to play stuff to trigger black's heroic abilities. You could also look into older sets where devotion was not yet a thing and black heavy costs were seen as a drawback, what they usually are.
Just by the looks of it, Vexing Devil, Goblin Guide & Hellspark Elemental. Depending on the nonbasic heavyness of your meta, you might consider Price of Progress.
If there was more blue than just Ashiok and Thassa, I would say keep Ashiok. Just don't think of him as a mill card, and mind what mondu said. If it buys atleast two turns, I think it did an ok job. If it nabs a somewhat relevant creature it did great.
As there are only these two blue cards, I'd cut them both and improve your manabase. (Random benefit, your Corrupt gets better) No need for lands that enter tapped. You could think of keeping the scry lands for scrying. Nyktos: Mana pools are emptied at the end of each step and phase. Don't worry tho, it still is a great land.
Three cards that return creatures from your graveyard is not much. March is also similar to Divination in that it gives you two cards for one. It costs more because you can choose what you get. And Gray Merchant is just a great target for either of the spells. Add a fourth.
Else, what Mondu said.
I'm surprised they didn't just reprint Gorgon Flail. While the severed head is awesome, a creature wielding said head seems off flavorwise. "Who needs a sword or an axe? I've got this head right here."
Flavourwise it is spot on. Perseus didn't need a schtick to whack people with the head.
Chromanticore is surprisingly fine. Like everyone else, I was expecting this to unplayable because it is not great and it really does not work with other cards (what with devotion and everything); however, it has been shown that it is better than it seems.
Post the deck in its current form.
Tell us what you want it to do.
Tell us how it currently does not what you want it to do.
Give us information on your meta.
Add budget and format restrictions.
If people say that card x or y would be good for your deck, you can always check your collection, ask for budget replacements, or different approaches.
4 Conqueror's Pledge
4 Spectral Procession
2 Timely Reinforcements
2 Midnight Haunting
4 Lingering Souls
2 Honor of the Pure
2 Duress
2 Thoughtseize
4 Oblivion Ring
2 Day of Judgement
2 Swords to Plowshares
4 Marsh Flats
4 Godless Shrine
4 Isolated Chapel
4 Plains
2 Swamp
if you say Blue Tron is ok, how is a deck like Pod that just is 'get the creature I need now' too hard? That's an autopilot compared to Tron. *?*
For example Rampant Growth or Sakura-Tribe Elder. While the latter is a creature, both ramp you the same way, they put a land into play. So that if you play them turn two and hit all your land drops, have four land out turn three.
A Fetch only replaces one land with an other. Lay of the Land's effect is also not ramp, because you will also not get more land onto the table than you can play normally.
I think you mean Selesnya Signet.
Looks more like you need more Nightmares. Maybe a Pod or two, or switch to Pod alltogether.
I don't like Karador in the list, and neither Gravecrawler. Four clamps might be one too much.
With Sheoldred: No mana needed.
I'm going out on a limb here and say that FoW is not as important you say here and lots of people do elsewhere. There's other reasonably cheap 1:1 (Force technically is 1:2, but that's besides the point) answers that would fill the gap atleast good enough. I'm sure there's loads of feedback loops in a counterfactual model, but something says me the changes in win ratios of unfair decks would be small and not be the deciding factor in the resulting meta game change, once it rebalanced itself, but that decks relying on FoW got weaker overall.
Modern has some of its bans because Wizards openly stated they do not want the format to be too fast. It's not (all) about balance. Legacy is what you get when you have balance as #1 priority. In some twisted way this makes sense for Modern, despite the naysayers. Formats need to be different for each to appeal to enough people. There's an example.
Probably not what you ment, but you are right, in that Modern needs a few more things to find a better self-balance that also keeps the speed under the desired limit. The BNG card Spirit of the Labyrinth's most outstanding feature is that it will make an impact in only one format, when two others also could play it. Implying it will not make the cut in Modern or Standard against more relevant options within each. Such cards give me hope that Wizards might manage to hit this good spot again in future sets. Over time often enough to let Modern evolve rather than being bred.
What a wall of words. With Wizards' updated wording atleast its is less of a jawbreaker. Might be too easy to enable off legendary lands, but then there's this balancing factor in that you can't add too many of a given cardtype to a list without potentially watering down the Tutor effect. An elegant feature :), preventing me from coming to a conclusion about this things power.
If this surprises you, you must have mistakenly taken expectations about specific areas of the forum that shall not be named to this place.
Artillery shells, cluster bombs and NBC's have proven more effective in rabbit extermination. I also heared German soldiers who had to secure 'Die Mauer' have acquired some competence on the field.
To me it's like a Coat of Arms just for the creature type Legend. It also has an attached mana sink, that is only worth it in the only kind of deck that will ever play this card. It's also obvious to the point of being displeasing.
What I actually came here for is a question and to end the post another bold hypothesis on blue cards.
First I'd like to know what you think to be the better play. The outline, and I hope I'm precise enough here, is that your opponent has a few creatures that could goldfish in three turns, you also have a three turn clock in one creature (Reckoner, so it won't be blocked). You're at ~24 life, the op. at 9. You play a deck with some direct damage spells (mostly Helixes, that's how you got the life). Your opponent plays green. Opponent is in topdeck mode, you hold a few irrelevant cards. Your opponent attacks for 8.
Now the actual play in question: You can either prevent the damage using utility lands resulting in no change of board position (yes, your opponent attacks into that), or take the damage and cast a Relevation for four. To Maze or to Stroke?
And to end: Gitaxian Probe's information is more valuable than Serum Visions' information.
I exclude the Ps and BS, because their extra over Reach Through Mists is more than just information. If those were excluded, I'd add them, but that's hairy to discuss.
Creatures with cast triggers, allthough those are, I think, and rightfully so, very few.
Sakura-Tibe Elder for example ramps Karador twice. On that note: You should also try to cast him for four to six mana. Else you might as well play Sheoldred, Whispering One and get a creature per turn for free plus an Edict engine, on a bigger body - only downside being she's uptight about her schedule and timing might nail you, where Karador is more flexible.
Green is mostly played for Harabaz Druid and giving you a plan B with the more agressive allies in the colours (the two drops and the flier).
Turntimber Ranger and some form of type manipulation to either hav him trigger off his tokens or make his tokens trigger him can also go infinite. This also happens to be in BUG colours, and he's not half bad.
2 Emeria, the Sky Ruin
4 Cavern of Souls
2 Seraph Sanctuary
2 Stomping Ground
2 Sacred Foundry
2 Temple Garden
6 Plains
4 Forest
Creatures
3 Druid of the Anima
3 Somberwald Sage
3 Catedral Sanctifier
2 Herald Of War
2 Archangel of Thune
2 Seraph of Dawn
2 Emancipation Angel
2 Seraph of the Sword
1 Akroma, Angel of Wrath
1 Avacyn, Angel of Hope
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
1 Aurelia, the Warleader
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons
1 Gisela, Blade of Goldnight
4 Safe Passage
2 Elixir of Immortality
3 Explore
3 Farseek
2 Quicksilver Amulet
3 Dawn Charm
2 Prismatic Strands
4 Boros Charm
3 Hallow
Planeswalker
3 Ajani Goldmane
Having creature based ramp in a meta full of decks with burn spells... You should play more land based or artifact based ramp. I know that Sage fixes all colours and ramps three, but so should your opponent and shoot them on sight.
If you play Fog effects, don't play those for three mana. Moment's Peace is a thing. Better than Fog effects is spells that gain you life while doing something usefull. F.e. Lightning Helix, probably better against Rakdos than spell based burn, but even if it's a good burn deck, a killing a Vexing Devil means you gained 7 life, sort of.
If you truely want to annoy them play a couple Martyr of Sands. Scrap Sanctifiers. An other option is Story Circle. You could also add more Angels that gain life, over ones that don't.
TaxRack is very good engine for CA, but no ramp. Try and see if you can capitalize on the CA enough to neglect the lack of ramping.
I'm sorry to tell you, but it's not Explosive Vegation. But Kodama's Reach for 1 more with scry 1.
http://media-dominaria.cursecdn.com/attachments/116/600/635267299853401390.jpg
turn one plays are really not as important as you might think, atleast in a setting where your former deck was not curbstomped by competitive modern/legacy or even vintage decks. ^^ you play black. in your case that means two things. 1) you can kill stuff 2) you have lifegain (the good one that also causes damage or loss of life). Phalanx of the Returned is a much stronger play against an agressive deck than an Asphodel Wanderer. You might take some damage, but the 3/3 will trade a lot better in combat than a 1/1, and the 2B regeneration is steep. Also, Phalanx does not have to be able to attack to be solid. It's an ok bonus if you have scry lands that can actiavte it and Graves that are also Swamps, but it's totaly not needed.
You also might want to look for permanent cards that have more black mana symbols in their cost, so you get higher devotion. it's kind of tricky with theros cards tho, as those were made with devotion in mind. F.e. Agent of the Fates probably is better than Fellhide Minotaur for your deck, even if you disregard its two abilities and the swapped p/t. Nevermind trying to play stuff to trigger black's heroic abilities. You could also look into older sets where devotion was not yet a thing and black heavy costs were seen as a drawback, what they usually are.
Burn is a very linear deck... so the Legacy thread is probably what you are looking for, or refer to as having read, if so, the link is for the other people. ^^ http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=518509
As there are only these two blue cards, I'd cut them both and improve your manabase. (Random benefit, your Corrupt gets better) No need for lands that enter tapped. You could think of keeping the scry lands for scrying. Nyktos: Mana pools are emptied at the end of each step and phase. Don't worry tho, it still is a great land.
Three cards that return creatures from your graveyard is not much. March is also similar to Divination in that it gives you two cards for one. It costs more because you can choose what you get. And Gray Merchant is just a great target for either of the spells. Add a fourth.
Else, what Mondu said.
Flavourwise it is spot on. Perseus didn't need a schtick to whack people with the head.
Has been shown to be better where/how?
The biggest surprise would be Perplexing Chimera. Very unique effect.
Tell us what you want it to do.
Tell us how it currently does not what you want it to do.
Give us information on your meta.
Add budget and format restrictions.
If people say that card x or y would be good for your deck, you can always check your collection, ask for budget replacements, or different approaches.