He exiled the one I targeted and said it was the only one in his deck. I didn't feel like calling the judge back to try to explain to him that there was no way he could only have one in his deck. He didn't play anymore if he was lying though.
I attended GP Detroit this weekend playing GR Tron. My overall record was 4-4, dropping after Round 8. I wish I would have played out Round 9 for the experience and potential Planeswalker points, but at that point, I was tired, hungry and mentally exhausted.
All of last week I waffled between playing the version that splashes Negate in the sideboard, the Llanowar Wastes version that splashes Slaughter Games or the traditional version that splashes neither.
By Friday night, I was set on the Negate version when I got a text from my friend informing me I should replace the blue splash with black and play Imp's Mischief. Imp's Mischief!! The argument was that it can redirect a Sowing Salt to my opponents Celestial Colonnade instead of merely negating it while it's basically the same trouble to cast it as a Negate would be. I'm secretly a closet fan of narrow, clunky cards, so why stop here?
At this point, it was nearly 2am and I let impulse take over instead of listening to reason and decided to play it.
I can be completely honest and admit I'm not a great Magic player. I've only been playing Tron the last month or so with limited time to test, nor do I get the chance to test against all the top-tier decks in the field. I'm happy with my result and I learned a lot about my deck.
Round 1 - UWr Flash (2-1 win)
Game 1 I tron'ed out early and landed a Karn. My opponent was bluffing counterspells the entire time but never actually countered anything.
Game 2 was more of a match of Magic. We battled back and forth and I ultimately lost to Cliques keeping me off the cards I needed. I assumed my opponent had brought in Sowing Salt's and attempted to Imp's Mischef his second Molten Rain (which wasn't a surprise to him because of his Clique), which was promptly Spell Snared.
Game 3 I had no problem assembling Tron but was unable to find Karn's or Wurmcoils in my deck. I eventually won on Turn 3 of extra turns by landing an Emrakul.
Round 2 - Scapeshift (2-1 win)
Game 1 was a quick game, Turn 3 tron, Wurmcoil, swing a few times, land an Ulamog, win.
Game 2 I incorrectly assumed he didn't bring in any Tron hate. When he landed a Sowing Salts turn 4, I knew I wouldn't win. I lost that game to Primeval Titan + Valakut triggers.
Game 3 I brought in Imp's Mischief and was actually able to re-direct his Turn 4 Salts to his Breeding Pool, which was his only non-basic at that point. We were playing on and end of the isle and had gathered a small crowd for some reason, it was nice to hear someone say "Man that guy has all the tech!". Since Sowing Salt reads "Search it's controllers...." even though Imp's Mischief changes the target land, my opponent essentially searches his hand and deck, not me. This was another odd game where I won by casting an Emrakul off of Tron lands without an Eye of Ugin the turn before I would have died to an active Valakut.
Round 3 - URw Splinter Twin? (0-2 Loss)
I'm ashamed to admit, I was feeling slightly cocky by this point, and I definitely paid for it.
Game 1 I lost to end of turn Restoration Angel, bouncing Pestermite, tapping down my Oblivion Stone (not sure why I didn't activate in response), then his next turn playing Kiki-Jiki, making infinite hasty Restoration Angels.
Game 2 I lost to similar Pestermite/Kiki-Jiki shenangians.
At the matches end, my opponent remarked that when I didn't side in 12 or so hate cards, he knew he would probably win. I never actually saw a Splinter Twin from his deck and got a shady answer when I asked if he had them.
Whatever.
Round 4 - Affinity (0-2 Loss)
The only thing to remark is that my opponent was playing main deck Spell Pierces. He admitted me to he had great draws and I was unable to find Pyroclasms.
Round 5 COMBO ELVES!! (0-2 Loss)
Game 1 my opponent played Turn 1 Joraga Treespeaker, turn 2 level into Llanowar Elf. I figured he had Elvish Archdruids and didn't want the Treespeaker to get out of clasm range, so I used my Pyroclasm to blow away his Treespeaker and Llanowar Elf. That didn't seem to phase him. He kept playing more elves which eventually got out of hand. I was mildly embarrassed that I lost to the combo of Intruder Alarm+Heritage Druid+Nettle Sentinel+Elvish Archdruid+Ant Queen to make infinite ants. After he passed the turn with infinite ants, I had 1 shot to find an Oblivion Stone, which I didn't.
Game 2 had a similar start of Treespeaker + Nettle Sentinel, met by my Pyroclasm again failed. He kept dropping more Elves and quickly lost to 2 Archdruids and 2 Heritage Druids on the aggro plan.
This match should have been EASILY won by me. Can't win them all though.
Round 6 GBw good stuff (2-0 win)
When I sat down, I could tell my opponent was having a bad afternoon (we were after all in the X-3 bracket). He was playing a combination or Liliana of the Veil, Bob, Goyf, Path to Exile, Deathrite Shaman, etc..
Game 1 I was able to Tron out to Wurmcoil to Ulamog which won the game.
Game 2 my opponent scooped after missing 3 consecutive Bob triggers. He admitted he was tilting and told me as he was scooping that he was leaving to get drunk.
Round 7 (2-0 win)
Opponent no-showed. Free win!
Round 8 UR Twin (1-2 loss)
Game 1 I draw my Tron cards into Ulamog which sealed the win.
Game 2 I was unable to find my sideboard cards and lost to end of Turn 3 Exarch, Turn 4 Twin.
Game 3 I drew my sideboard cards and my opponent managed to fight through Defense Grid + Torpor Orb to win before I assembled Tron and landed anything of note.
By far, my more interesting matches were the first 4, which the last 4 didn't have a lot of substance. I casted Imp's Mischief twice, while resolving it only once versus the Scapeshift deck. I don't think things would have ended up any different had they been Negates. My feeling on the card is that, like Negate, it's a very cute trick that lacks substance. Negate's scope seems to be a little more broad while Imp's Mischief basically reads "Counter target Sowing Salt or Molten Rain". I'll continue to play the deck, but will probably swap back to the version that plays Slaughter Games or the more traditional version that run's 2 Forests and the aforementioned "12 pieces of Twin hate"
tl;dr Went 4-4 at GP Detroit, played Imp's Mischief, wasn't that great. I'm a mediocre magic player.
Looking around the MTGO daily events page, I've seen a lot of GR Tron decks that pack 3-4 Mindslaver's in the SB (and sometimes MB) without blue mana or Academy Ruins to abuse them.
Is this a MTGO meta call or just good all-around value?
The problem I had with Negate is sometimes it feels a little too cute. I brought it in against a UWR Flash match thinking I could next-level my opponent and use it to resolve a Karn or Wurmcoil.
I learned quickly that Negate doesn't too much in the face of a fist full of Cryptics, Spell Snares, Snapcasters and other counter magic. I felt like I wanted Defense Grid more than anything in that match.
I will say Negate is house in the mirror and most other non-blue decks.
Last week I was playing in a 4-player game. I warp world-ed with roughly 20 permanents on board, and about 60 between the 4 of us.
One of the permanents I world'ed into was a Grip of Chaos.
I knew that would make figuring out triggers slightly hairy, so I decided to call my L1 Judge friend over to help sort things out. The first word out of his mouth was "We're going to need a sheet of paper to figure this out." at which point everyone scooped.
That was the most satisfying insta-win I ever had.
Is Marrow Shards a viable sideboard card for Wolf Run? I feel like I can deal with a titan, and shards would deal with 1 or multiple attacking Nexuses.
That's true. I expect to see a lot more RG ramp this weekend. I strangely played two RG Werewolf decks last week and I struggled with which Swords to swap in and out. I ultimately sided out two War and Peace and sided in two Feast and Famine. That's probably bad Magic sideboarding, but going up to six Swords seemed worse.
Last week I ran 4 Swords, 2 Metamorphs and 2 Tumble Magnets to deal with Crusader. On game three against UW Humans, I thought I was pretty big game copying his Crusader with my Metamorph until he Fiend Hunter'ed it the next turn. The other problem is there's usually an anthem effect that usually just reduces the Metamorph to chump-block for a turn.
His other secret tech: Sudden Disappearance. I never felt so awful losing a game I probably shouldn't have lost.
Rant aside, my question is this. In Todd Anderson's deck tech, he dropped three Tumble Magnets from his SCG tournament to playing 2 Precursor Golems at the Pro Tour. It seems like playing one less card (for 2 more mana) against Mirran Crusader is pretty bad. Maybe its statistically marginal?
My playgroup uses rolls a die to determine the player, then another die roll to determine the permanent when using Grip of Chaos, that usually works well.
Does this deck have any other answers to Timely Reinforcements apart from Chandra's Phoenix or adding Hero of Oxid Ridge?
I was testing the SCG list the other night. I was feeling great winning most of my matches until I played a list with Snapcaster, Geist, Hero of Bladehold, O-Ring and 3 MB Timely's. One game I had done about 40 damage to him and had with absolutely no chance of winning.
I really can't figure out if I just had bad luck, or am a bad Magic player (probably the latter), but 6-8 effective copies of Timely Reinforcements is really disheartening.
Last weekend I cast a Wild Ricochet'ed, Reverberate'd Chandra Ablaze's ultimate Warp World. For the sake my my personal well being and mental health, we decided Warp World'ing three times would be enough.
The first WW, my magic number was 27, the second time I was down to 21 and the final time I was down to 14 permanents shuffled back in. By the end of the next turn, I had amassed to much hate I was dead. The first Warp World was pretty cool but about half way through Warp World #2 I decided I wanted the madness to be over.
He exiled the one I targeted and said it was the only one in his deck. I didn't feel like calling the judge back to try to explain to him that there was no way he could only have one in his deck. He didn't play anymore if he was lying though.
Here is the list I sleeved up:
1 Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre
1 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
3 Wurmcoil Engine
Planeswalker
4 Karn Liberated
Sorcery
4 Pyroclasm
4 Ancient Stirrings
4 Sylvan Scrying
Artifact
4 Prophetic Prism
4 Expedition Map
4 Chromatic Star
4 Oblivion Stone
3 Relic of Progenitus
4 Grove of the Burnwillows
1 Forest
1 Ghost Quarter
4 Urza's Tower
4 Urza's Power Plant
4 Urza's Mine
1 Eye of Ugin
1 Llanowar Wastes
2 Torpor Orb
3 Imp's Mischief
2 Defense Grid
2 Beast Within
2 Spellskite
4 Nature's Claim
All of last week I waffled between playing the version that splashes Negate in the sideboard, the Llanowar Wastes version that splashes Slaughter Games or the traditional version that splashes neither.
By Friday night, I was set on the Negate version when I got a text from my friend informing me I should replace the blue splash with black and play Imp's Mischief. Imp's Mischief!! The argument was that it can redirect a Sowing Salt to my opponents Celestial Colonnade instead of merely negating it while it's basically the same trouble to cast it as a Negate would be. I'm secretly a closet fan of narrow, clunky cards, so why stop here?
At this point, it was nearly 2am and I let impulse take over instead of listening to reason and decided to play it.
I can be completely honest and admit I'm not a great Magic player. I've only been playing Tron the last month or so with limited time to test, nor do I get the chance to test against all the top-tier decks in the field. I'm happy with my result and I learned a lot about my deck.
Round 1 - UWr Flash (2-1 win)
Game 1 I tron'ed out early and landed a Karn. My opponent was bluffing counterspells the entire time but never actually countered anything.
Game 2 was more of a match of Magic. We battled back and forth and I ultimately lost to Cliques keeping me off the cards I needed. I assumed my opponent had brought in Sowing Salt's and attempted to Imp's Mischef his second Molten Rain (which wasn't a surprise to him because of his Clique), which was promptly Spell Snared.
Game 3 I had no problem assembling Tron but was unable to find Karn's or Wurmcoils in my deck. I eventually won on Turn 3 of extra turns by landing an Emrakul.
Round 2 - Scapeshift (2-1 win)
Game 1 was a quick game, Turn 3 tron, Wurmcoil, swing a few times, land an Ulamog, win.
Game 2 I incorrectly assumed he didn't bring in any Tron hate. When he landed a Sowing Salts turn 4, I knew I wouldn't win. I lost that game to Primeval Titan + Valakut triggers.
Game 3 I brought in Imp's Mischief and was actually able to re-direct his Turn 4 Salts to his Breeding Pool, which was his only non-basic at that point. We were playing on and end of the isle and had gathered a small crowd for some reason, it was nice to hear someone say "Man that guy has all the tech!". Since Sowing Salt reads "Search it's controllers...." even though Imp's Mischief changes the target land, my opponent essentially searches his hand and deck, not me. This was another odd game where I won by casting an Emrakul off of Tron lands without an Eye of Ugin the turn before I would have died to an active Valakut.
Round 3 - URw Splinter Twin? (0-2 Loss)
I'm ashamed to admit, I was feeling slightly cocky by this point, and I definitely paid for it.
Game 1 I lost to end of turn Restoration Angel, bouncing Pestermite, tapping down my Oblivion Stone (not sure why I didn't activate in response), then his next turn playing Kiki-Jiki, making infinite hasty Restoration Angels.
Game 2 I lost to similar Pestermite/Kiki-Jiki shenangians.
At the matches end, my opponent remarked that when I didn't side in 12 or so hate cards, he knew he would probably win. I never actually saw a Splinter Twin from his deck and got a shady answer when I asked if he had them.
Whatever.
Round 4 - Affinity (0-2 Loss)
The only thing to remark is that my opponent was playing main deck Spell Pierces. He admitted me to he had great draws and I was unable to find Pyroclasms.
Round 5 COMBO ELVES!! (0-2 Loss)
Game 1 my opponent played Turn 1 Joraga Treespeaker, turn 2 level into Llanowar Elf. I figured he had Elvish Archdruids and didn't want the Treespeaker to get out of clasm range, so I used my Pyroclasm to blow away his Treespeaker and Llanowar Elf. That didn't seem to phase him. He kept playing more elves which eventually got out of hand. I was mildly embarrassed that I lost to the combo of Intruder Alarm+Heritage Druid+Nettle Sentinel+Elvish Archdruid+Ant Queen to make infinite ants. After he passed the turn with infinite ants, I had 1 shot to find an Oblivion Stone, which I didn't.
Game 2 had a similar start of Treespeaker + Nettle Sentinel, met by my Pyroclasm again failed. He kept dropping more Elves and quickly lost to 2 Archdruids and 2 Heritage Druids on the aggro plan.
This match should have been EASILY won by me. Can't win them all though.
Round 6 GBw good stuff (2-0 win)
When I sat down, I could tell my opponent was having a bad afternoon (we were after all in the X-3 bracket). He was playing a combination or Liliana of the Veil, Bob, Goyf, Path to Exile, Deathrite Shaman, etc..
Game 1 I was able to Tron out to Wurmcoil to Ulamog which won the game.
Game 2 my opponent scooped after missing 3 consecutive Bob triggers. He admitted he was tilting and told me as he was scooping that he was leaving to get drunk.
Round 7 (2-0 win)
Opponent no-showed. Free win!
Round 8 UR Twin (1-2 loss)
Game 1 I draw my Tron cards into Ulamog which sealed the win.
Game 2 I was unable to find my sideboard cards and lost to end of Turn 3 Exarch, Turn 4 Twin.
Game 3 I drew my sideboard cards and my opponent managed to fight through Defense Grid + Torpor Orb to win before I assembled Tron and landed anything of note.
By far, my more interesting matches were the first 4, which the last 4 didn't have a lot of substance. I casted Imp's Mischief twice, while resolving it only once versus the Scapeshift deck. I don't think things would have ended up any different had they been Negates. My feeling on the card is that, like Negate, it's a very cute trick that lacks substance. Negate's scope seems to be a little more broad while Imp's Mischief basically reads "Counter target Sowing Salt or Molten Rain". I'll continue to play the deck, but will probably swap back to the version that plays Slaughter Games or the more traditional version that run's 2 Forests and the aforementioned "12 pieces of Twin hate"
tl;dr Went 4-4 at GP Detroit, played Imp's Mischief, wasn't that great. I'm a mediocre magic player.
Is this a MTGO meta call or just good all-around value?
I learned quickly that Negate doesn't too much in the face of a fist full of Cryptics, Spell Snares, Snapcasters and other counter magic. I felt like I wanted Defense Grid more than anything in that match.
I will say Negate is house in the mirror and most other non-blue decks.
Last week I was playing in a 4-player game. I warp world-ed with roughly 20 permanents on board, and about 60 between the 4 of us.
One of the permanents I world'ed into was a Grip of Chaos.
I knew that would make figuring out triggers slightly hairy, so I decided to call my L1 Judge friend over to help sort things out. The first word out of his mouth was "We're going to need a sheet of paper to figure this out." at which point everyone scooped.
That was the most satisfying insta-win I ever had.
Do you have problems with Thalia and 8 non-creatures?
Also, any thought to Manic Vandal over Revoke Existence in the SB?
His other secret tech: Sudden Disappearance. I never felt so awful losing a game I probably shouldn't have lost.
Rant aside, my question is this. In Todd Anderson's deck tech, he dropped three Tumble Magnets from his SCG tournament to playing 2 Precursor Golems at the Pro Tour. It seems like playing one less card (for 2 more mana) against Mirran Crusader is pretty bad. Maybe its statistically marginal?
Playing the card usually ends up with so much hate that it only sticks around a turn or two.
I was testing the SCG list the other night. I was feeling great winning most of my matches until I played a list with Snapcaster, Geist, Hero of Bladehold, O-Ring and 3 MB Timely's. One game I had done about 40 damage to him and had with absolutely no chance of winning.
I really can't figure out if I just had bad luck, or am a bad Magic player (probably the latter), but 6-8 effective copies of Timely Reinforcements is really disheartening.
The first WW, my magic number was 27, the second time I was down to 21 and the final time I was down to 14 permanents shuffled back in. By the end of the next turn, I had amassed to much hate I was dead. The first Warp World was pretty cool but about half way through Warp World #2 I decided I wanted the madness to be over.