And how do we know for a fact that the store owner isn't sending them back or using them for other events or whatever WOTC requires to be done with them?
Because we are trusting the OP's information to be correct. If he second guess him, we may as well not be talking at all. Not to mention there is zero logical reason not to use them as additional prize support at the prelease unless he plans on selling them for profit. Sending them back would cost him, and not make his players more happy, and if he plans to hand them out for an event, why not the event at hand that he is supposed to hand them out for?
Heck, I drive over an hour to play a Standard 30 person tourney on wednesdays, with 5 doller pay in, and the credit goes back to the top 4.
That said, most people aren't really bothering with this small inbetween time. First Caw is lame, so no one wants to play. Then they Ban him, and no one wants to put together a deck they can play for what, 2 weeks? Than we have a prerelease and releases, and FINALLY we get back to what will be standard for a long time. Once the M12 releases are done, I expect to see a lot more t2 Constructed.
Everyone is missing the OP's actual point. It's not about that 3 dollers, or how much he charges, it's about the two boxes of M12 that Wizards GIVES to the Shop Owner to use as prize support, which the shop owner is not doing.
Are those the only stores for magic in each respective area? Perhaps you have not done enough research. I find it very common for towns/cities with 2 or more shops to stagger their type of events and which nights they run them on, thus not actually competing with one another.
It could also have to do with the latest Jace fiasco, where perhaps they simply switched to draft since no one wanted to play standard. Maybe they will switch back after M12.
I think everyone is seriously underrating this card right now.
It's possibly the most efficiently costed beatstick in the format right now if you're playing mostly black.
I hear a creature that creatures a 4 turn clock starting on turn 4 is good in a meta filled with two combo decks that plan to win turn 4-5(Valakut/Twin)
Spikeshot is a fine card, and while Lavamancer and Spikeshot look very similar, they actually perform very different roles. Spikeshot is a mana sink, he's an amazing late game card. Lavamancer on the other hand can start doing a shock almost every turn straight away, he CAN be much more aggressive.
The meta is currently very saturated by two decks which plan to kill you on turn 4-6. With that in mind, you shouldn't be getting more than two damage out of Spikeshot Elders ability, if that, since hopefully your mana is tied up at that stage of the game killing your opponent by casting staggershocks and cracking shrines.
Spikeshot can give your deck amazing reach and longetivity, but when half your matches are a race, he simply is not worth a slot in your deck.
Expect him to see more play when both SpliterTwin and Valakut rotate out of standard, at which point you will have cards like Koth, Lavamancer, Spikeshot and Chandra's Phoenix to have amazing card advantage throughout the late game, without worrying about your opponent comboing out.
Gee, sorry if Preordain and Ponder aren't good enough for ya. And you said it yourself, Tezz's Gambit is a worse Divination! So Black is supposed to use a blue card (that is considered unplayable in blue) as its card draw?
There is a difference between Blue not being broken, and Black becoming even less playable.
MBC: Is pretty bad. Despite all the amazing cards it's received, hundreds of pages of discussion and testing by intelligent people, it can't over come one simply fact. Its card draw sucks.
WOTC has been trying to promote a mono-color friendly standard, and have admitted such. So why would they cripple Black's ability to function as a color by itself?
People are upset, because Black hasn't been a viable Midrange, or Control color in a while (seriously, imagine Blue as counterspells and cantrips, and that's roughly the equivalent to black's role of Removal and sometimes Disruption). Zombies. Great. Except that the last set promoted a different black aggro (infect), and the core set is split between vampires and Zombies for it's support...
They try to make black do too much, without letting it do what it traditionally does. R, G, and W are usually aggro decks. B shows up sometimes with decent showings. U, W, and B and usually control decks. So why would you print effective means for White to run Aggro OR control (Gideon Jura/O-ring, Knight Exemplar/Hotp/Elspeth/Mirran Crusader/Brave the elements).
Tl;Dr: Black's identity has gone from control, mill, occasionaly graveyard centric, and mono-acceleration, with aggro being a rare sight, to
Removal, bad planeswalkers, and hand disruption.
Your crying because your deck couldn't compete as a control deck against blue based control decks, when JTMS was in standard. No deck was really viable except JTMS decks, so just take it with context.
Your also complaining that black midrange has been bad, and wotc is crapping all over you, when really all midrange strategies have been unplayable because of Valakut.
So whats the real issue here? It's not that black is weak, it's that your trying to compete against first JTMS then Valakut, when we all know Valakut crushes diversity.
It's a graveyard themed set, and it has Flashback.
With that said, just because the set is based around GY does not mean Lavamancer will be better. Unless your dredging, how is a graveyard based theme supposed to fill your GY faster unless they literally print R:Shock, mill 3. Most likely since it will be a "Graveyard matters" block, you won't want to be removing some of the stuff in your GY.
Yes, but I think most of them only bring in dismember against Twins. Pretty sure they don't have an answer game 1.
Don't count on that. Only bad players don't MD dismember. It answers every problem creature for RDW, and a seasoned player will play it MD, and keep it in against UB. RDW's life total is irrelevant unless you've swung the board in your position, so it will keep it's easier out to things like Grave. Ping and kill? Easy.
When I talk about the card I speak purely as a SB card.
Against Control if you play it, they can't really win, aside from Bolting themselves with an Oring. Koth can be answered, although he is still amazing.
If you can play it before Valakut plays their Titan, your in business, but if not, it's bad. I suppose It could be a SB card when your on the Play. Though I don't know the curve of Valakut well enough to know if my turn 4 is early enough. I imagine it is though, since I've probably killed their mana dude.
While I was not heavily playing magic during Shards/Zen Standard, I do know that Manabarbs saw some serious play in Boros Bushwacker. The card seems great on paper. I don't know if this would be more or less efficient than Koth at the top of our curve against control though. Since I've never played with Manabarbs.
Perhaps some people here who have played with it can share there insights.
I don't know why people are glossing over what I wrote and instead just going "herp derp Dismember". Yes, he has an answer, so do most cards. Dismember, while an amazing card against him is not what is holding him back. As i've said before, the problem is he has no place in this meta. Either your racing combo, playing control or fighting against a red burn deck that ignores him.
Because we are trusting the OP's information to be correct. If he second guess him, we may as well not be talking at all. Not to mention there is zero logical reason not to use them as additional prize support at the prelease unless he plans on selling them for profit. Sending them back would cost him, and not make his players more happy, and if he plans to hand them out for an event, why not the event at hand that he is supposed to hand them out for?
That said, most people aren't really bothering with this small inbetween time. First Caw is lame, so no one wants to play. Then they Ban him, and no one wants to put together a deck they can play for what, 2 weeks? Than we have a prerelease and releases, and FINALLY we get back to what will be standard for a long time. Once the M12 releases are done, I expect to see a lot more t2 Constructed.
It could also have to do with the latest Jace fiasco, where perhaps they simply switched to draft since no one wanted to play standard. Maybe they will switch back after M12.
I hear a creature that creatures a 4 turn clock starting on turn 4 is good in a meta filled with two combo decks that plan to win turn 4-5(Valakut/Twin)
The meta is currently very saturated by two decks which plan to kill you on turn 4-6. With that in mind, you shouldn't be getting more than two damage out of Spikeshot Elders ability, if that, since hopefully your mana is tied up at that stage of the game killing your opponent by casting staggershocks and cracking shrines.
Spikeshot can give your deck amazing reach and longetivity, but when half your matches are a race, he simply is not worth a slot in your deck.
Expect him to see more play when both SpliterTwin and Valakut rotate out of standard, at which point you will have cards like Koth, Lavamancer, Spikeshot and Chandra's Phoenix to have amazing card advantage throughout the late game, without worrying about your opponent comboing out.
Your crying because your deck couldn't compete as a control deck against blue based control decks, when JTMS was in standard. No deck was really viable except JTMS decks, so just take it with context.
Your also complaining that black midrange has been bad, and wotc is crapping all over you, when really all midrange strategies have been unplayable because of Valakut.
So whats the real issue here? It's not that black is weak, it's that your trying to compete against first JTMS then Valakut, when we all know Valakut crushes diversity.
With that said, just because the set is based around GY does not mean Lavamancer will be better. Unless your dredging, how is a graveyard based theme supposed to fill your GY faster unless they literally print R:Shock, mill 3. Most likely since it will be a "Graveyard matters" block, you won't want to be removing some of the stuff in your GY.
No good player will attack into an Obliterator unless he is winning the game. He is a moat on the defense.
Can we please not use bad play as examples for why cards are good?
Don't count on that. Only bad players don't MD dismember. It answers every problem creature for RDW, and a seasoned player will play it MD, and keep it in against UB. RDW's life total is irrelevant unless you've swung the board in your position, so it will keep it's easier out to things like Grave. Ping and kill? Easy.
Against Control if you play it, they can't really win, aside from Bolting themselves with an Oring. Koth can be answered, although he is still amazing.
If you can play it before Valakut plays their Titan, your in business, but if not, it's bad. I suppose It could be a SB card when your on the Play. Though I don't know the curve of Valakut well enough to know if my turn 4 is early enough. I imagine it is though, since I've probably killed their mana dude.
Perhaps some people here who have played with it can share there insights.