MTG Salvation

Quote from CruxMDQ »

And while we're at it, what awesome synergies do you guys see for The First Sliver?

Scroll Rack. As someone who has played their fair share of Maelstrom Wanderer, the best thing to do with with cascade is to control what gets cascaded. The First Sliver though is a brand new escalation that surpasses the Wanderer because after the First Sliver resolves, Each Sliver you cast after that will get you a new Cascade trigger, including the ones you cast off cascade. For example, the new Changling Lord could cascade into up to seven slivers, depending on how you stack the deck (hopefully through legal mechanics within the game).

I think my favorite and least favorite thing about this is that after The First Sliver resolves, the next Sliver that you cast that cascades... if that sliver cascades into another sliver, that sliver will cascade as well. So cascading a 6 cost sliver could get up to five-six slivers (is there a 0 sliver?) onto the battlefield depending on the cmc's you hit on the way. It at least gives hypothetical sliver decks a reason pick Tormod's Crypt for their sideboards I suppose.

I think the most amusing thing about this new Urza is that he was clearly under the planeswalker template at some point with something like this:

+1: Tap an untapped artifact you control: Add U.
-2: Create a 0/0 colorless Construct artifact creature token with "This creature gets +1/+1 for each artifact you control."
-9: You get an emblem with "5: Shuffle your library, then exile the top card. Until end of turn, you may play that card without paying its mana cost.

And that's only assuming that the mana cost was still 2UU and had a starting loyalty of four (it's eventual toughness). IF they costed him higher, they could have attached more powerful abilities to this hypothetical version of Urza, i.e. putting the Construct token on plus, Tolarian Academy on the small minus, and his ultimate not requiring to shuffle before doing Mind's Desire.

However, as fun as it would be to speculate what a planeswalker version of Urza could have been, the card we have is a creature. In Modern, he seems fine. I would say that costing four is a problem for him, but costing four isn't exactly a potential killer as four cost cards see play all over Modern. It doesn't do him any favors though either. The token is... neat. The mana off artifacts can probably find a home because as the Command Zone podcast mentioned: he turns all your artifacts in Mox Sapphire, which is considered one of the best cards in the game. So yeah, there's that. Good luck doing all the things with his Mind's Desire dig effect, but I'm sure there's something out there.

As for commander... he's going straight to the top. He's everything Teferi, Temporal Archmage wants to be but without requiring a slot for The Chain Veil. Bannable, I dunno, but printing a card that looks like it captures the full spirit of the combo winter Urza Block doesn't seem to be like it's going to do nothing. Oh well, that's the Gitrog Monster's and Thrasios' problem.

Quote from DanzBorin »

It will be a sideboard card every now and again to check unfair decks. It won't be some powerhouse.

I think our fundamental disagreement is that my definition of a "fair" deck in Modern is one that goes 0-3 drop in any sanctioned or recorded event. It doesn't have to be a powerhouse; it just has to keep the opponent from running away with the game.

Quote from DanzBorin »

It's not better than FoW. In fact it's not a very good card at all. People are going to argue, but the reason FoW is good is it is an unconditional answer that can stop a combo. This is situational and therefore doesn't fit the bill. Hopefully Pact of Will is better.

What combo in modern goes off on their opponent's turn? Because I can tell you right now that the reason that the alternate cost only works on opposing turns is so that combo decks can't pick this up as easily themselves. I'm okay with that restriction, and I suspect Blue players will be as well when they pitch something to stop a Karn Liberated or Goryo's Vengeance.

Also, Force of Will isn't unconditional. I've had games where I've been Duressed/Inquisitioned/Thoughtseized/etc. and they took my blue card instead of Force.

This card is literally Force of Will but worse...

...

Buy four copies for all your blue decks and extra to sell off when people realize that Force of Will but worse is still Force of Will.

Quote from Lord Seth »

Quote from Spsiegel1987 »

They still have titans to beat face with so its not quite a beat down.

True, but without Valakut, Titan is just a 6/6 and we should have no problem dealing with it. I used to run 4x Leyline of the Void maindeck in Tron (this was years ago, back when Storm and Valakut were huge) and as long as I had a Leyline in play I really wasn't afraid at all of their Primeval Titans.

Do you mean Leyline of Sanctity? Because while Leyline of the Void does hit storm hard, it's not really good against Titanshift.

Also, regarding the larger conversation about Witchbane Orb against TitanShift (and other decks that win like that), do it. It shuts down one of their primary win conditions. It's not good enough for the mainboard, but for a wishboard, making a TitanShift Deck actually attack you is a serious problem for the TitanShift player. That deck isn't designed to be aggro, so forcing it to be one gives you a serious advantage and more time to win the game.

Quote from Trav_Ragnar »

Yeah, I'm debating here. Possibly considering Sphinx's Revelation as well. But I do run Austere Command, so mass artifact/enchantment removal is covered.

Also, opinions on Aminatou, the Fateshifter? Taking another look at it, as it's plus is alright, and it's minus (not ult) seems really good as it allows us to renew other planeswalkers and activate their abilities twice a turn. 3 CMC is also appealing, but the ultimate is fairly mediocre.

Animatou is fine. She works best in her own deck, but she's not a detriment to the deck. Her plus is useful if you can start shuffling your deck to get rid of dead cards (and if money isn't an issue, that's easy with fetchlands). Her small minus is excellent, and fun fact, is another way to get the Chain Veil + Teferi Temporal Archmage combo going. So, if you find room for her, go for it. I will say though I generally play her in Atraxa because there's extra space from dropping red or her own deck.

Quote from whiffy penguin »

I agree. But it’s litterally a two card win the game combo. Her narrowness does not matter when you win the game every time you resolve both.

The problem with Samut + Doubling Season is that Doubling Season is a one card combo that does not need Samut to win the game on the spot. The situation you're describing with Doubling Season works with almost any other planeswalker, so why not use them instead of Samut? Samut should really go into superfriends decks that rely on their general or just in heavier creature decks instead.

Quote from MrCorbac »

Emrakul could also just be a way to win through a board like Karn GC on both side plus mycosynth on either side (discard emrakul, shuffle your graveyard into your library, can't deck yourself, gg).

That's so narrow that I'd honestly go for Kozilek, Butcher of Truth if that's the case because at least Kozi 1.0 can be cast as early as turn four if that scenario doesn't happen.

Quick question: the featured Tron deck on MTGGoldfish for me right now is the New Karn, the Great Creator version of the deck, but it also has an Emrakul, the Aeons Torn in the maindeck. Is that just spice that happened to work or is the card making a comeback?

For reference: Here's a link to the list

Quote from Trav_Ragnar »

Thinking about dropping Cleansing Nova for Primevals' Glorious Rebirth. Opinions?

What else do you have in the deck that can do Cleansing Nova's job?

I generally prioritize mass destruction over recursion because in my experience, blowing out a board has more of an impact than recursion with a restriction on top of it. HOWEVER, if you feel you have your destruction bases covered (with Cleansing Nova, I'm specifically referring to the destroy all artifacts and enchantments part), then yes, go ahead. Even though I'm playing skeptic here, it is an excellent recursion card for the deck.

Also, since Cleansing Nova has flexibility, you may want to consider a less flexible mass destruction card in the deck as well.

Other decent five color generals for Superfriends include Niv-Mizzet Reborn because we run a lot of cards with color pairs and The Ur-Dragon because he's an advantage engine that also cheats cards into play, albeit a less effective one outside his home. I've also had some success with Progenitus in the past as a late game "well, I guess I'm just going to hit your face now." He also makes planeswalkers with global pumps better, i.e Ajani Steadfast. The only legal five color legendary creature that I think actively work against our deck is Child of Alara because that hits our board presence where it hurts. Everything else has pros, cons, quirks, and/or is a placeholder. Good luck sending a message with Atogatog I suppose.

He deleted his post, but that's essentially what happened from what I gathered from the Tolarian Community College's book review, which people should watch. And it only goes downhill from there with almost all the other characters. If the Tolarian Community Colleges book review is accurate (and I believe him because I've read another book review that's similar about the book's quality floating around in some other user's signature that I liked as well), this book will probably rank up there with the worst of them (thinking of New Phyrexia and Original Zendikar books era).

Quote from FunkyDragon »

Quote from Mockingbird »

part of this will involve that Jace, Cunning Castaway isn't that good on his own.

I already have to cut cards I love to fit in new stuff - there's no way I'd cut a good card for a bad one with a slim chance of pulling a combo. I'm hoping that if I have Nicol Bolas, Dragon-God out, I'm already winning.

In my testing, I think the combo is viable... but there's a huge caveat, and that caveat is that you're playing an entirely different deck, which is a Control Combo deck with Superfriends elements. I figured that out when I realized that the combo allows me to cut the number of Planeswalkers down by more than half for other controlly cards and tutors. So, my current response is that if you want to test Nicol Bolas with Jace, Cunning Castaway's abilities, build the deck for it, don't just jam it into superfriends. More testing may change my opinion still.

One thing to note is that in corner cases Karn, the Great Creator animating cantrip artifacts can be useful in making 1/1 chumpers. Chromatic Star can trade with x/1's and Chromatic Sphere, Relic of Progenitus, and Expedition Map can chump block then sac so long they don't have sickness.

Also, I like the idea of Bond of Flourishing, but the tepid follow up to it makes me a little hesitant to try it out for myself.