I know that I've been away for a while (newborn humans in my Family yay!) but with the announcement that the site is closing down I wanted to take the opportunity to thank you for all the XCB 'games' over the years. I've always felt incredibly welcome here when I drop in for a few months after years away and even though I've been gone more than I've been here, I will miss this part of this place.
4) MyNameIsFourteen :: Chancellor Is Going to Be So Excited If Casting It Affects a Match
Chancellor of the Forge / Daze / Foil / Tropical Island / Utopia Mycon
1) CalvinSchwa
Abolish / Eladamri's Vineyard / Elvish Spirit Guide / Phyrexian Unlife / Savannah
Foil counters vineyard and my goblin goes the distance, I think.
6-0
2) ManyCookies :: Balance in All Things
Balance / Greater Gargadon / Lotus Bloom / Swan Song / Volcanic Island
Just makeing sure I understand your line, against a goldfish you:
1)Volcanic Island, suspend[10], suspend[3] (18 life)
2)[9][2]
3)[8][1]
4)[7], cast bloom, sack for WWW, tap for UU, sack land to gargadon [6], cast balance with UUW floating, 1 card in hand, 0 permanenets. If i daze the balance you pay for it, if I then foil the balance you swan song that. You fall to (13) from all that mana you're spending/burning, and I sac my whole board. Frowns.
0-6 I think
3) Mogg
Blazing Shoal / Blazing Shoal / Chancellor of the Forge / Chancellor of the Forge / Maze of Ith
As you said, I can get blockers down in time.
6-0
5) Personman
Arcane Denial / Gemstone Caverns / Invisible Stalker / Sinkhole / Underground Sea
My goblin wins the race against your stalker, especially since you pay 2 life to cast him. Of course, you can trade those two off whenever you want. Can I get mycon through your disruption? I think yes.
If I'm on the play you make caverns removing Sea, otherwise you play Sea, go on your t1.
I play Tropical Island, tap for g (19) cast mycon
If you go for the counter, you fall to 18 from the mana and I daze.
Goblin token plus mycon races stalker.
6-0
6) Superbajt
Black Lotus / Black Lotus / Empty the Warrens / Purphoros, God of the Forge / Sandstone Needle
My counterspell stops you from emptying and purphorosing, but empty alone is enough to beat me.
0-6
7) WhammeWhamme
Counterspell / Dark Depths / Gemstone Caverns / Island / Thespian's Stage
I've gone and sent in another deck that dies to Marit Lage.
0-6.
It's late, and I'm being a bit fast and loose in my logic. Some of these are probably incorrect.
I guess this actually leads me to an interesting idea – I'd been thinking for a while that it would be nice to repeat a format occasionally, to allow for meta development. But what if instead we tried two consecutive weeks in which we first do a format as 3CH, and then once people have seen what's out there, we run it again as 2CH?
On a separate topic, I like to keep the ban list as a short as is reasonable, which means there are usually some number of cards that I keep on an informal watch list. At the moment, that list consists of two cards:
1) Time Vault Time Vault / Voltaic Key shows up less than I expect it to, but the combo nonetheless makes me a bit nervous every time I run a land rule format with more than two cards (or two cards with a built-in win condition).
2) Dark Depths
Originally, Vampire Hexmage was banned instead, because – of the two cards – Depths is the one that could still see play. Depths does see play and does so more than I'd anticipated. That's not necessarily a problem, as its results are inconsistent. What I'm interested in is how players feel about the card; does it feel oppressive/stifling, or is it just a good win condition?
I'm interested in reading players' thoughts on these two cards. Also, are there any other cards that should be on my watch list?
Thanks!
I would love to see a Depths ban - or a Thespian's Stage ban if you really want to cling to the idea that paying 30 for Marit Lage might happen. I actually don't mind it in Vanilla sorts of rounds, but I hate that there's an obviously reasonable deck that gets around many of the special rules rounds that only impact spells.
I also want to belatedly second superbajt's comments that last week's format was too complex for me. I submitted Depths because I couldn't reason my way out of that set of rules and I just wanted to sidestep it - but I don't love that I had that option.
@superbajt how exactly do I make some ring and Lage on turn 2? If my lands are stage and depths, I have to tap stage to cast Sol ring, and then I can't also tap stage to make Lage.
6) MyNameIsFourteen :: LazyDeckbuilding
Dark Depths / Sol Ring / Thespian's Stage
1) Anachronity
Leyline of Sanctity / Predator Ooze / Swan Song
6-0 If only Ooze could fly.
2) Curvograph :: Stagnation
Braids, Cabal Minion / Land Equilibrium / Mana Crypt
Welcome to PHM! Land equilibrium is a card that I just read for the first time. If I'm reading right it is awesome in this format.
If you're on the play you go island, crypt, equilibrium saccing island, I now can't play land and you can play and sac a land each turn.
0-6.
3) Feyd_Ruin: In the Revenge Business
Gaea's Revenge / Mana Crypt / Mana Crypt
You kill me during with your 3rd land drop. I kill you with my third combat step.
3-3
4) Magus of the Aesthetic :: I Wrote 2,700 Words This Week, So Here Are Three Cards From The FAQ
Azusa, Lost but Seeking / Dark Ritual / Voidstone Gargoyle
Your t1 is something like
swamp, sac for BG
dark ritual BBBG
asuza, B
Plains, plains, tap and sac for BWWWW, gargoyle.
Then you're attacking for 5 each turn (including sacrificing a land for damage) So in a race you win on the combat step of your 5th turn.
You shut off my sol ring, so my race is
Land
Depths
Stage, Lage
Attack for 20.
Even when you're on the play, lage interrupts your rush (by being an untapped blocker) when I have at least 10 life. That is enough cushion for me to force a gargoyle chump and then kill you the following turn.
7) Personman
Banefire / Ensnaring Bridge / Leyline of Sanctity
I cannot beat T1 enstaring bridge (saccing leyline for mana)
0-6
8) Superbajt
Eternal Scourge / Food Chain / Nature's Claim
This is just a race right? You remove my sol ring, so I make lage during my 3rd turn and kill on 4, but you combo off on turn 3
0-6
9) WhammeWhamme
Commandeer / Land Equilibrium / Mana Drain
I think I can beat this land equilibrium deck when I'm on the play.
Stage, Sol Ring, go
Island, go
Depths, lage, go
Ilsand, Equilibrium, go
attack, GG.
If you comandeer the sol ring, then you just have your 19 turn clock, which Lage beats.
3-3
6 | 6 0 2 6 0 X 0 0 2 | 16
As much as I hate Dark Depths and as much as this hand was bad this week, I'm glad I submitted it because none of my other ideas would have fared better. I really wanted to jam a fast Mindslaver (or Emrakul, the promised end) to make people sac their wincons or loop Riftsweepers, but the former just wouldn't work and the latter would have been way too slow. Food chain + eternal scourge is a much better version of the exile loop idea.
@Anachronity right, I forgot that the land you bounce with chancery is also a free play on turn two, so you go off on turn 3 rather than 4. We are 3-3.
Just to absolutely clarify: they are not counted as a part of the hand, so in this round, if I draft 5 normal cards and a Conspiracy, I submit 3 normal cards and make choices for a Conspiracy, and my submission may look like it had 4 cards?
Yeah, it's just like a conspiracy booster draft. The cards we draft but don't put into our 3 card deck are in our sideboard, and per the normal rules of conspiracies, at the start of each game we put any number of conspiracies from our sideboard into the command zone. The only difference here is that because we have robots playing for us, we have to lock in the decision about what conspiracies to put in the command zone at the time we submit our deck instead of during the start of game procedure.
Good Games, Well Played.
6 | 2 6 2 2 0 X 2 0 6 6 | 26 | 289
Where should I put all these bricks?
Chancellor of the Forge / Daze / Foil / Tropical Island / Utopia Mycon
Abolish / Eladamri's Vineyard / Elvish Spirit Guide / Phyrexian Unlife / Savannah
Foil counters vineyard and my goblin goes the distance, I think.
6-0
2) ManyCookies :: Balance in All Things
Balance / Greater Gargadon / Lotus Bloom / Swan Song / Volcanic Island
Just makeing sure I understand your line, against a goldfish you:
1)Volcanic Island, suspend[10], suspend[3] (18 life)
2)[9][2]
3)[8][1]
4)[7], cast bloom, sack for WWW, tap for UU, sack land to gargadon [6], cast balance with UUW floating, 1 card in hand, 0 permanenets. If i daze the balance you pay for it, if I then foil the balance you swan song that. You fall to (13) from all that mana you're spending/burning, and I sac my whole board. Frowns.
0-6 I think
3) Mogg
Blazing Shoal / Blazing Shoal / Chancellor of the Forge / Chancellor of the Forge / Maze of Ith
As you said, I can get blockers down in time.
6-0
5) Personman
Arcane Denial / Gemstone Caverns / Invisible Stalker / Sinkhole / Underground Sea
My goblin wins the race against your stalker, especially since you pay 2 life to cast him. Of course, you can trade those two off whenever you want. Can I get mycon through your disruption? I think yes.
If I'm on the play you make caverns removing Sea, otherwise you play Sea, go on your t1.
I play Tropical Island, tap for g (19) cast mycon
If you go for the counter, you fall to 18 from the mana and I daze.
Goblin token plus mycon races stalker.
6-0
6) Superbajt
Black Lotus / Black Lotus / Empty the Warrens / Purphoros, God of the Forge / Sandstone Needle
My counterspell stops you from emptying and purphorosing, but empty alone is enough to beat me.
0-6
7) WhammeWhamme
Counterspell / Dark Depths / Gemstone Caverns / Island / Thespian's Stage
I've gone and sent in another deck that dies to Marit Lage.
0-6.
4 | 6 0 6 X 6 0 0 | 18
I also want to belatedly second superbajt's comments that last week's format was too complex for me. I submitted Depths because I couldn't reason my way out of that set of rules and I just wanted to sidestep it - but I don't love that I had that option.
Dark Depths / Sol Ring / Thespian's Stage
1) Anachronity
Leyline of Sanctity / Predator Ooze / Swan Song
6-0 If only Ooze could fly.
2) Curvograph :: Stagnation
Braids, Cabal Minion / Land Equilibrium / Mana Crypt
Welcome to PHM! Land equilibrium is a card that I just read for the first time. If I'm reading right it is awesome in this format.
If you're on the play you go island, crypt, equilibrium saccing island, I now can't play land and you can play and sac a land each turn.
0-6.
3) Feyd_Ruin: In the Revenge Business
Gaea's Revenge / Mana Crypt / Mana Crypt
You kill me during with your 3rd land drop. I kill you with my third combat step.
3-3
4) Magus of the Aesthetic :: I Wrote 2,700 Words This Week, So Here Are Three Cards From The FAQ
Azusa, Lost but Seeking / Dark Ritual / Voidstone Gargoyle
swamp, sac for BG
dark ritual BBBG
asuza, B
Plains, plains, tap and sac for BWWWW, gargoyle.
Then you're attacking for 5 each turn (including sacrificing a land for damage) So in a race you win on the combat step of your 5th turn.
You shut off my sol ring, so my race is
Land
Depths
Stage, Lage
Attack for 20.
6-0
5) ManyCookies :: Omnomnom
Anguished Unmaking / Eternal Scourge / Food Chain
I cannot defeat T2 Anguished unmaking.
0-6
7) Personman
Banefire / Ensnaring Bridge / Leyline of Sanctity
I cannot beat T1 enstaring bridge (saccing leyline for mana)
0-6
8) Superbajt
Eternal Scourge / Food Chain / Nature's Claim
This is just a race right? You remove my sol ring, so I make lage during my 3rd turn and kill on 4, but you combo off on turn 3
0-6
9) WhammeWhamme
Commandeer / Land Equilibrium / Mana Drain
I think I can beat this land equilibrium deck when I'm on the play.
Stage, Sol Ring, go
Island, go
Depths, lage, go
Ilsand, Equilibrium, go
attack, GG.
If you comandeer the sol ring, then you just have your 19 turn clock, which Lage beats.
3-3
As much as I hate Dark Depths and as much as this hand was bad this week, I'm glad I submitted it because none of my other ideas would have fared better. I really wanted to jam a fast Mindslaver (or Emrakul, the promised end) to make people sac their wincons or loop Riftsweepers, but the former just wouldn't work and the latter would have been way too slow. Food chain + eternal scourge is a much better version of the exile loop idea.