Is it normal that deflecting palm be so low? Seemed like a good card to me. The other cards truly are bad, except the savant, which I thought I read people liked. (I guess I'm saying that goldfish data tend to be fishy.)
Deflecting Palm is the most situational card in the entire set. It is good in exactly one situation: your opponent is attempting to deal you damage in some way, but you can redirect that damage to their face and kill them (or put them close enough to dead to kill them on the crackback). It will just be a complicated burn spell that does 2-4 damage to the opponent and does nothing to affect the board all other times. It can't target creatures and it can't prevent damage from being dealt to a creature as a pseudo-combat trick. It's also straight card disadvantage unless you are countering a burn spell to the face. Hilariously, though, it does nothing against a raided Arrow Storm.
Now, the other thing I find interesting is that you call all of these cards 'truly bad.' Yet this is the neighborhood in which Scheming resides. It's bad because it doesn't win games when it is cast.
Please keep comments to the card, and not personal. -Hardened
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@Ken_Carson
Speaking of red herrings, the hypothetical card you brought up:
0 Schemer's Paradise - Enchantment
1U: Discard a card. You may look at the top 5 cards of your library and put any number of them into the graveyard. Put the rest back on top of your library in any order. Activate this ability only when you could cast a sorcery.
is a pretty blatant one. Of course requiring a two card investment up front is going to make the card unplayable. Two Schemings in the opening hand would also be unplayable 9/10 times, but at least wouldn't eat up three cards and force you to wait until you've drawn a post-Scheming blank. That's like adding "As an additional cost discard a card" to Wetland Sambar, it's a pointless hypothetical with an obvious answer.
@Ken_Carson
Speaking of red herrings, the hypothetical card you brought up:
0 Schemer's Paradise - Enchantment
1U: Discard a card. You may look at the top 5 cards of your library and put any number of them into the graveyard. Put the rest back on top of your library in any order. Activate this ability only when you could cast a sorcery.
is a pretty blatant one. Of course requiring a two card investment up front is going to make the card unplayable. Two Schemings in the opening hand would also be unplayable 9/10 times, but at least wouldn't eat up three cards and force you to wait until you've drawn a post-Scheming blank. That's like adding "As an additional cost discard a card" to Wetland Sambar, it's a pointless hypothetical with an obvious answer.
You concurrently got and missed the points I'm trying to make. Card disadvantage is not worth the effect that Taiga's Scheming provides.
You concurrently got and missed the points I'm trying to make. Card disadvantage is not worth the effect that Taiga's Scheming provides.
And doubling the card disadvantage is such a substantial change that it makes your argument irrelevant. Most non-cantrip cards would be unplayable if you gave them the same treatment as in your example. Scheming is harmed even more than most by that ridiculous enchantment example since you wouldn't have trash cards to pay the discard cost with after binning and stacking your library. If the card is as bad as you say it is then you shouldn't have to fundamentally alter it to demonstrate your point.
You concurrently got and missed the points I'm trying to make. Card disadvantage is not worth the effect that Taiga's Scheming provides.
And doubling the card disadvantage is such a substantial change that it makes your argument irrelevant. Most non-cantrip cards would be unplayable if you gave them the same treatment as in your example. Scheming is harmed even more than most by that ridiculous enchantment example since you wouldn't have trash cards to pay the discard cost with after binning and stacking your library. If the card is as bad as you say it is then you shouldn't have to fundamentally alter it to demonstrate your point.
It's not doubling the card disadvantage. You would bin one card to gain the effect provided by Scheming. You would still have the created card in play, and in later turns you could continue to bin cards to stack your library. I wouldn't play that card even it it said 'At the beginning of the game, you may search your deck for Schemer's Paradise and put it into your hand.' The effect is not worth a card slot. But all of that is beside the point.
One point of my created card is to point out what you are doing when you cast a Scheming. You are discarding a card to manipulate the top of your library and your graveyard at the cost of 1U. There is simply no other way to put it. The other point of the created card was to show that there is such a thing as wasting a card slot on a card that does something, but doesn't do enough to justify its inclusion. That's what Taiga's Scheming is. A card that does something, but not enough to justify its inclusion in any competitive Limited deck.
(Duh, I didn't read it and forgot deflecting palm could not redirect damage to a creature! I thought it was in the shining shoal category.)
Scheming is a card that is middling to good in a very small subset of situations.
This is the crux of the disagreement. I think scheming is playable in a delve deck because KtK games are longer than other recent limited environments which makes cards that have longer-term impact relevant. Deck need multiple effects: mana, threats, answers and support cards. Decks run a lot of lands, many creatures, some answers and a few support cards. Scheming is in the latter camp. It's not a card you want multiple of and it needs to supports something specific. I hope this answers both why I'd not run your hypothetical card and why it might explain the goldfish stats (i.e. I think the card can easily be played in the wrong deck.)
Specifically, scheming is good when:
1. Your hand is sketchy. (Say, 2 lander, not a great curve.) It those situations, it saves you a mulligan.
2. Your hand is good, you deck runs delve cards and you don't have two-drop anyway.
3. The game goes long and top-decking better becomes the deciding factor.
I think all those situations occur quite frequently. Would I rather run a great card instead? Yes. Are limited decks 100% great cards? No. In my experience in FNM drafts, I'd say either #1 and #3 happen in most games (mostly #3, thankfully.)
It's not doubling the card disadvantage. You would bin one card to gain the effect provided by Scheming. You would still have the created card in play, and in later turns you could continue to bin cards to stack your library. I wouldn't play that card even it it said 'At the beginning of the game, you may search your deck for Schemer's Paradise and put it into your hand.' The effect is not worth a card slot. But all of that is beside the point.
One point of my created card is to point out what you are doing when you cast a Scheming. You are discarding a card to manipulate the top of your library and your graveyard at the cost of 1U. There is simply no other way to put it. The other point of the created card was to show that there is such a thing as wasting a card slot on a card that does something, but doesn't do enough to justify its inclusion. That's what Taiga's Scheming is. A card that does something, but not enough to justify its inclusion in any competitive Limited deck.
It is doubling the disadvantage because you're expending two cards in order to get the same effect. In theory you might activate it again at some point down the line, but that consumes a third card; meanwhile the enchantment sits there doing nothing else. Compare to just having a Scheming in hand, particularly the opening hand when you're making mulligan decisions, and it's clear that your altered version is far worse, almost strictly. The altered version is also awful in a top deck war, doing nothing the turn it's drawn and requiring a second blank before you can fix your library; the real card can be played immediately, with an otherwise empty hand.
I think scheming is playable in a delve deck because KtK games are longer than other recent limited environments which makes cards that have longer-term impact relevant.
Just because you say so? The average KTK game is 9.8 turns. M15 was 9.5 turns.
1. Your hand is sketchy. (Say, 2 lander, not a great curve.) It those situations, it saves you a mulligan.
OK, but you need to also have the Scheming in your opener or as the top card of your library. Since you say it's a one-of, that's ~13%. So for it to be good in this situation (which is never more than 13%), you also need a sketchy hand (say 35% of the time) which also has blue mana. We're talking like 3%-4% of games at this point.
2. Your hand is good, you deck runs delve cards and you don't have two-drop anyway.
Again, we have a Scheming in our opener (13% of games), but our hand is good, just lacking a 2-drop. Call me crazy, but I'd rather have the two-drop which can attack and block.
Would I rather run a great card instead? Yes. Are limited decks 100% great cards? No. In my experience in FNM drafts, I'd say either #1 and #3 happen in most games (mostly #3, thankfully.)
Again, I'll say it. Regardless what your anecdotal experience has been in FNM, about 1 in 30 draws happen as you describe in situation one. As for Limited deck construction, that's an argument for playing literally any card, so I'll ignore it. And #3 might happen in games where players are playing lots of suboptimal cards, but it happens much more infrequently in games where both players have built strong decks.
I think scheming is playable in a delve deck because KtK games are longer than other recent limited environments which makes cards that have longer-term impact relevant.
Just because you say so? The average KTK game is 9.8 turns. M15 was 9.5 turns.
First of all, that is slow. Small differences in the average number of turns are more impactful than they looks. As another reference point, the average game length of M14, which was notorious for being so slow that draw spells were first picks, was just a little higher at 10.1 turns.
Quote from Goldfish »
The format is slow, ending on the average turn of 9.8 (M15 9.5, BNG 8.9)
Second, that assumes you have no prior knowledge about your deck and your opponent's. Some matchups are going to be slower than others, and you could side this in if you need some late game virtual card advantage and don't mind that it's as slow as molasses. Early game I don't like it because you don't have as much junk to dump (unless your deck is junk). But being insurance for borderline hands and dark ritual for delve spells are pretty narrow but OK side benefits.
Finally, those turn numbers are for draft, and draft is faster than sealed. I'd be more likely to consider boarding it in sealed than draft, especially because maybe you just didn't open Bitter Revelation or whatever. But again, probably it chills in the sideboard for most matchups.
The one point in scheming's favor no one has pointed out is that assuming you've seen 9 cards from your deck by keeping 7 and drawing 2 by turn 2 before you cast it it lets you see a total of 14 cards deep into your deck, which is over a third, which means as long as you have roughly 3 delve creatures you will probably have found it and achieved the combo. EDIT: just shy of a third if you're on the play instead but basically a third both ways.
My main problem with the card is that the 'delve deck' isn't really a thing. The more you try to turn delve into a combo with a high count of delve cards and some number of enablers instead of just playing regular quality curve out limited and having stuff wind up in the graveyard as a natural consequence of play to fuel a modest number of delve cards you too often wind up with the wrong ratio of enablers to delve cards and they both then become incredibly bad for you if you draw them out of order. Also self decking can be a real concern especially with grindier long game focused decks which are sultai's specialty. On it's own merits outside trying to delve combo it's just kinda underwhelming, id rather cast any basic 2 mana bear on 2 if they were both in my hand and castable and if you want a later card advantage blue spell there's normally no shortage of weave fates and treasure cruises getting passed.
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So if you agree that Scheming is card disadvantage and yet argue that it is good, can you please list all the Limited playable cards that have built in card disadvantage? The only one that comes to mind is Act of Treason. Got any others?
Crystal Ball isn't card disadvantage. It's a permanent. Cards that add tokens to the board are also not card disadvantage. And cards with flashback replace themselves sitting in the graveyard. Cards with Rebound replace themselves with a free cast. And instant bounce spells often lead to card advantage by blowing out the opponent in combat or some other way. Then you just posted a bunch of 'win on the spot' spells or extremely archetype dependent spells.
It is funny that the defense of Scheming has come to comparing its card disadvantage to Overrun.
I initially thought this card was utter and total garbage, but having seen it in action, I've upgraded that assessment to an "I'd rather not play this, but will play it at certain times". I no longer think of it as the worst common in the set.
Quite simply, it's a very solid draw in the very late game (if the game goes that long). Scheming showing Wetland Sambar, Island, UW lifeland, Efreet Weaponmaster, Treasure Cruise is a huge, huge blowout - your next turn is going to be amazing. Even if instead of Cruise you just had another lategame-oriented creature, your Scheming has significantly improved your next two turns by removing a series of dead draws.
If you have Scheming, you are probably favored in a long game.
I do not endorse using it just to turbocharge an early Delve spell unless that spell is likely to win you the game. Just getting a fast 4/4 isn't worth it as you'll just end up getting 2 for 2'ed in combat.
I'm on the fence as to whether Scheming is ever playable (I doubt it is, board state is too important in this format), but I'm constantly struck by the number of times I've seen it misplayed at my LGS. Nobody ever uses it as a delve ritual, nor a way to improve topdeck quality. It always seems to play out like a T2 Index, maybe with one or two prematurely binned lands. Of course, these players are routinely clobbered.
Not that this says anything towards the overall playability of it, but it really is a card of extremes. It's almost like a charm:
-Fix risky land or spell-light opening hand.
-Ritual out an early threat to get critically ahead on tempo.
-On average, bin 2 lands in a top deck war and slightly improve your upcoming threats.
At almost no other time has it looked close to playable. All of these are scenarios that come up a fair bit, but the standard for this format is a midrange war where mana represented is critical. Additionally, mode 2 and mode 3 aren't generally wanted in the same deck.
I think it's only good if you already have a delve card in hand. Not in the library. Or have some way to net something immediately, like Abomination of Gudul.
Errr, you're joking about that second version of the card, right? That's a card I'd play a 4-of in limited deck since it basically allows me to play with a 36-cards deck (39-cards deck in your example of a singleton). Plus, I can now pitch irrelevant card for 2 mana in the late game (i.e. pitch irrelevant lands when I have the mana to spend). What you're describing is basically what those conspiracy special cards were, except better since they diminish your deck size.
Anyway, I don't have anything more to say on scheming. I don't think people will change their opinion of the card on mere arguing, and my position is not that the card is good, merely that the card is not unplayable.
Quite simply, it's a very solid draw in the very late game (if the game goes that long). Scheming showing Wetland Sambar, Island, UW lifeland, Efreet Weaponmaster, Treasure Cruise is a huge, huge blowout - your next turn is going to be amazing. Even if instead of Cruise you just had another lategame-oriented creature, your Scheming has significantly improved your next two turns by removing a series of dead draws.
Imagine if you drew a Bitter Revelation instead. Insert <mindblown> here.
Similarly, if you are play Scheming in a Jeskai deck with your only potential Delve cards being Treasure Cruise and the much rarer Dig Through Time, you are losing that long game since you'll never get to it.
All of these are scenarios that come up a fair bit, but the standard for this format is a midrange war where mana represented is critical. Additionally, mode 2 and mode 3 aren't generally wanted in the same deck.
Can we dispense with the myth that Scheming fixing your mana is even a remotely common occurrence? Statistics put the probability of such a scenario as happening in less than 5% of games. Assuming that you even win 60% of those games, you are talking about having to play 100 games to find 3 in which a turn 2 Scheming 'saved you' from a rough draw. So, if you played Scheming in 33 matches, it might fix your so well that one time it is the reason you won a game. Statistics also say that you will probably lose the large majority of your matches in which you cast Scheming, so it's definitely not worth it.
Also self decking can be a real concern especially with grindier long game focused decks which are sultai's specialty.
I'm surprised that I haven't seen anyone with this deck play Cranial Archive yet; it's similar to Scheming in that it's nearly garbage in any other deck, but can really smooth out the weak spots of a "delve deck."
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Imagine if you drew a Bitter Revelation instead. Insert <mindblown> here.
Similarly, if you are play Scheming in a Jeskai deck with your only potential Delve cards being Treasure Cruise and the much rarer Dig Through Time, you are losing that long game since you'll never get to it.
I don't think anyone ITT is picking Scheming over Bitter Revelation, so I don't see your point here. Revelation isn't even the same color. In your Jeskai example it triggers prowess and fixes your next few draws; I can certainly think of worse situations to find yourself in, most of which involve bad top decking.
Can we dispense with the myth that Scheming fixing your mana is even a remotely common occurrence? Statistics put the probability of such a scenario as happening in less than 5% of games. Assuming that you even win 60% of those games, you are talking about having to play 100 games to find 3 in which a turn 2 Scheming 'saved you' from a rough draw. So, if you played Scheming in 33 matches, it might fix your so well that one time it is the reason you won a game. Statistics also say that you will probably lose the large majority of your matches in which you cast Scheming, so it's definitely not worth it.
I've run a singleton twice and it's already fixed my mana once by putting my 4th land second from the top. The 2 lands and a Scheming scenario might be infrequent, but that only weakens the argument, it doesn't discredit it. When evaluating cards you need to think about all stages of the game, early, mid, and late; Scheming improves your odds of a keepable hand, which pushes it toward the playable side.
Ironically, I am pretty sure I would play Schemer's Paradise, but am unlikely to play Tiagam's Scheming. If you can enter a board stall situation with that active, every land you draw lets you strip out the next 2-3 irrelevant draws. By upgrading your late game land draws into tiagam's schemings, you are effectively gaining card advantage by eliminating large numbers of dead draws. The longer the game goes, the more advantage you accumulate until you overwhelm your opponent. It also can fix early game mana issues, or let you dig extremely deep for answers to opposing bombs; if your opponent T5 sagu mauler's you with 4 untapped lands, you could dig 15-20 cards deep in search of a dead drop, for example. It would also be beyond absurd with the zombie making delve spell, if you ever got those together you probably just delve 5, 5, 10 on turns 2, 3 and 4 then make 12 zombies on turn 5 every game you get it in your opener. It would be so much more powerful than just a 1 shot Tiagam's Scheming, that it would actually be a pretty reasonable card.
That isn't too surprising though, any 0 cost enchantment that let you ditch lands late game for a marginal card's effect would almost certainly be playable. Even something that let you do the same thing with Feed the Pack would be playable, I am pretty sure; gaining 5 or 10 life per turn is much, much different than doing it once. The closest I can think of for that in recent times would be trading post, where the 4 life/turn was quite relevant a lot of the time. I mean, trading post did other relevant stuff too, but if it gained 10 life/card it would have definitely been playable with just that ability alone.
EDIT: That does make me wonder if a deck with, like, 6 tiagam's schemings and an Empty the Pits would actually work. The schemings would let you hit more schemings after a certain point, and the empty the pits is strong enough to be worth throwing your whole hand and deck away to power it out. I might try that if I get an empty the pits some time.
Can we dispense with the myth that Scheming fixing your mana is even a remotely common occurrence? Statistics put the probability of such a scenario as happening in less than 5% of games. Assuming that you even win 60% of those games, you are talking about having to play 100 games to find 3 in which a turn 2 Scheming 'saved you' from a rough draw. So, if you played Scheming in 33 matches, it might fix your so well that one time it is the reason you won a game. Statistics also say that you will probably lose the large majority of your matches in which you cast Scheming, so it's definitely not worth it.
I've run a singleton twice and it's already fixed my mana once by putting my 4th land second from the top. The 2 lands and a Scheming scenario might be infrequent, but that only weakens the argument, it doesn't discredit it.
Did you ultimately win the game in which you cast it? And as far as parsing terms between 'weaken' and 'discredit,' you are absolutely splitting hairs.
When evaluating cards you need to think about all stages of the game, early, mid, and late; Scheming improves your odds of a keepable hand, which pushes it toward the playable side.
I'm not sure you understand the concept of 'all stages' the way you think you do, because Scheming is horrible in the mid-game, horrible when you are losing, and horrible when you are winning.
Furthermore, you can argue anecdotes against statistics all you want, but Scheming might improve your draw in 3%-5% of games. In an 18-land deck, you have a 57% chance to have a 3-4 land hand and you would much rather have threats and answers in those hands. Scheming isn't going to make you keep a 0, 1, or 6-land hand, so you're left with it improving the draws of 2 and 5-land hands. This happens roughly 33% of the time. Let's say you have a 5 lander. You therefore have 2 nonland cards, and one of those two has to be Scheming and not the other 21 cards in your deck. That's so rare it's not even worth mentioning. So we are left with the ~22% chance that you have a 2-land hand. Now let's add in the variable of having Scheming as one of your 5 spells. Then add the fact that one of your 2 lands must produce U mana. Again, this will happen so rarely that it's not worth discussing.
This argument is going in circles, but it fascinates me to once again observe people defending bad cards. This is not a personal comment about anyone, because I've seen this happen so many times. Someone will always come along to defend a below-average card.
I'm curious what brew of characteristics leads to this, because I can't personally empathize. To me, I love identifying a card that is bad in theory, bad in personal small sample size, and bad in data like Goldfish. "This is great," I think, "because I can completely ignore this card and free up more thinking space for meaningful decisions." I actively want to put card in the trash bin. I don't really care if maybe it should be the 23rd card of my deck 1% of the time because I want to focus on much more relevant issues at hand. By the midpoint of a format, I don't even really see the bad cards anymore. They fade into the background.
Others behave in the opposite way -- grasping for any reason to not discard the card. Bristling at the slur "unplayable." It really feels like an emotional element is involved. It's White Knight'ing for Magic cards. "If I defend this card's honor, it will reward me with secret tech wins at FNM!"
EDIT: That does make me wonder if a deck with, like, 6 tiagam's schemings and an Empty the Pits would actually work. The schemings would let you hit more schemings after a certain point, and the empty the pits is strong enough to be worth throwing your whole hand and deck away to power it out. I might try that if I get an empty the pits some time.
I'm pretty sure if I ever tried this my opponent would have Death Frenzy in their hand.
That would be hilarious, but depending on what they're doing, you might be able to kill them through that by waiting an extra turn, going for 14 zombies at end of turn 6 and killing them in a single attack. This is more likely to work against decks that play Death Frenzy because they are less likely to be able to pressure you into needing to do something before turn 6 to avoid dying. I would be more worried about countermagic or fast aggro starts that can kill you by turn 5, honestly. Still, I feel like it could be a limited combo deck, which I always enjoy. They don't come along very often, but I liked playing Havoc Festival+Explosive Impact in Return to Ravnica and Reality Spasm+Echo Mage in Rise of the Eldrazi, so I feel like I might have to try this if given the chance.
Did you ultimately win the game in which you cast it? And as far as parsing terms between 'weaken' and 'discredit,' you are absolutely splitting hairs.
The game in question happened weeks ago, so I don't remember the outcome, or even which match it was in; I'm only able to recall that casting in detail because I can refer back to my post on page 1. I've won after casting it and lost after casting it.
I'm not sure you understand the concept of 'all stages' the way you think you do, because Scheming is horrible in the mid-game, horrible when you are losing, and horrible when you are winning.
Furthermore, you can argue anecdotes against statistics all you want, but Scheming might improve your draw in 3%-5% of games. In an 18-land deck, you have a 57% chance to have a 3-4 land hand and you would much rather have threats and answers in those hands. Scheming isn't going to make you keep a 0, 1, or 6-land hand, so you're left with it improving the draws of 2 and 5-land hands. This happens roughly 33% of the time. Let's say you have a 5 lander. You therefore have 2 nonland cards, and one of those two has to be Scheming and not the other 21 cards in your deck. That's so rare it's not even worth mentioning. So we are left with the ~22% chance that you have a 2-land hand. Now let's add in the variable of having Scheming as one of your 5 spells. Then add the fact that one of your 2 lands must produce U mana. Again, this will happen so rarely that it's not worth discussing.
You keep insisting that it's horrible in all phases, but you haven't given any convincing arguments. You have, however, resorted to making up an imaginary version of the card that's worse in almost every situation and told us about how good some other cards that everyone knows are good are. No one is out to prove that this is a high pick or format staple. It's on the right side of the playable line and is a relevant late pick that's generally available in triple Khans. No one is arguing that the drawbacks, particularly the card disadvantage, are negligible. The argument is that the benefits outweigh them, at least enough to justify running the card. That's not exactly a high bar.
@phyrre56
I'm not in the habit of forcing bad cards. In fact not too long ago I was on the other side concerning this very card and the only reason that changed was that it happened to be in my draft pool during a week that I had an unusably large glut of delve cards. Turns out my instinctive disdain of this card was unwarranted and that's why I revived this thread. I did not expect a fringe playable to be so controversial, but there's been some good analysis at various points so I think it's a good thing (kind of wish the Scheming v Scout question had gotten more attention).
Throwing around pejorative terms like white knight, even if you qualify it like you did, demonstrates that you're incapable of supporting your position with reasoned arguments. If there are still any arguments about the card that haven't come out yet I'd like to see them, but let's not stray from talking about Scheming and its usefulness in Khans limited.
Deflecting Palm is the most situational card in the entire set. It is good in exactly one situation: your opponent is attempting to deal you damage in some way, but you can redirect that damage to their face and kill them (or put them close enough to dead to kill them on the crackback). It will just be a complicated burn spell that does 2-4 damage to the opponent and does nothing to affect the board all other times. It can't target creatures and it can't prevent damage from being dealt to a creature as a pseudo-combat trick. It's also straight card disadvantage unless you are countering a burn spell to the face. Hilariously, though, it does nothing against a raided Arrow Storm.
Now, the other thing I find interesting is that you call all of these cards 'truly bad.' Yet this is the neighborhood in which Scheming resides. It's bad because it doesn't win games when it is cast.
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UFblthpU
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BGVarolzGB
URWZedruuWRU
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Speaking of red herrings, the hypothetical card you brought up:
0 Schemer's Paradise - Enchantment
1U: Discard a card. You may look at the top 5 cards of your library and put any number of them into the graveyard. Put the rest back on top of your library in any order. Activate this ability only when you could cast a sorcery.
is a pretty blatant one. Of course requiring a two card investment up front is going to make the card unplayable. Two Schemings in the opening hand would also be unplayable 9/10 times, but at least wouldn't eat up three cards and force you to wait until you've drawn a post-Scheming blank. That's like adding "As an additional cost discard a card" to Wetland Sambar, it's a pointless hypothetical with an obvious answer.
Pauper: Burn
Modern: Burn
Legacy: Burn
EDH: Marath, Will of the Wild - Ramp/Combo | Anafenza the Foremost - French | Uril, the Miststalker - Voltron | Freyalise, Llanowar's Fury - Goodstuff
Ghost Council of Orzhov - Tokens | Lazav, Dimir Mastermind - Control | Isamaru, Hound of Konda - Tiny Leaders
You concurrently got and missed the points I'm trying to make. Card disadvantage is not worth the effect that Taiga's Scheming provides.
RBGLiving EndRBG
EDH
UFblthpU
BRXantchaRB
BGVarolzGB
URWZedruuWRU
And doubling the card disadvantage is such a substantial change that it makes your argument irrelevant. Most non-cantrip cards would be unplayable if you gave them the same treatment as in your example. Scheming is harmed even more than most by that ridiculous enchantment example since you wouldn't have trash cards to pay the discard cost with after binning and stacking your library. If the card is as bad as you say it is then you shouldn't have to fundamentally alter it to demonstrate your point.
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EDH: Marath, Will of the Wild - Ramp/Combo | Anafenza the Foremost - French | Uril, the Miststalker - Voltron | Freyalise, Llanowar's Fury - Goodstuff
Ghost Council of Orzhov - Tokens | Lazav, Dimir Mastermind - Control | Isamaru, Hound of Konda - Tiny Leaders
It's not doubling the card disadvantage. You would bin one card to gain the effect provided by Scheming. You would still have the created card in play, and in later turns you could continue to bin cards to stack your library. I wouldn't play that card even it it said 'At the beginning of the game, you may search your deck for Schemer's Paradise and put it into your hand.' The effect is not worth a card slot. But all of that is beside the point.
One point of my created card is to point out what you are doing when you cast a Scheming. You are discarding a card to manipulate the top of your library and your graveyard at the cost of 1U. There is simply no other way to put it. The other point of the created card was to show that there is such a thing as wasting a card slot on a card that does something, but doesn't do enough to justify its inclusion. That's what Taiga's Scheming is. A card that does something, but not enough to justify its inclusion in any competitive Limited deck.
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This is the crux of the disagreement. I think scheming is playable in a delve deck because KtK games are longer than other recent limited environments which makes cards that have longer-term impact relevant. Deck need multiple effects: mana, threats, answers and support cards. Decks run a lot of lands, many creatures, some answers and a few support cards. Scheming is in the latter camp. It's not a card you want multiple of and it needs to supports something specific. I hope this answers both why I'd not run your hypothetical card and why it might explain the goldfish stats (i.e. I think the card can easily be played in the wrong deck.)
Specifically, scheming is good when:
1. Your hand is sketchy. (Say, 2 lander, not a great curve.) It those situations, it saves you a mulligan.
2. Your hand is good, you deck runs delve cards and you don't have two-drop anyway.
3. The game goes long and top-decking better becomes the deciding factor.
I think all those situations occur quite frequently. Would I rather run a great card instead? Yes. Are limited decks 100% great cards? No. In my experience in FNM drafts, I'd say either #1 and #3 happen in most games (mostly #3, thankfully.)
It is doubling the disadvantage because you're expending two cards in order to get the same effect. In theory you might activate it again at some point down the line, but that consumes a third card; meanwhile the enchantment sits there doing nothing else. Compare to just having a Scheming in hand, particularly the opening hand when you're making mulligan decisions, and it's clear that your altered version is far worse, almost strictly. The altered version is also awful in a top deck war, doing nothing the turn it's drawn and requiring a second blank before you can fix your library; the real card can be played immediately, with an otherwise empty hand.
Pauper: Burn
Modern: Burn
Legacy: Burn
EDH: Marath, Will of the Wild - Ramp/Combo | Anafenza the Foremost - French | Uril, the Miststalker - Voltron | Freyalise, Llanowar's Fury - Goodstuff
Ghost Council of Orzhov - Tokens | Lazav, Dimir Mastermind - Control | Isamaru, Hound of Konda - Tiny Leaders
OK, but you need to also have the Scheming in your opener or as the top card of your library. Since you say it's a one-of, that's ~13%. So for it to be good in this situation (which is never more than 13%), you also need a sketchy hand (say 35% of the time) which also has blue mana. We're talking like 3%-4% of games at this point.
Again, we have a Scheming in our opener (13% of games), but our hand is good, just lacking a 2-drop. Call me crazy, but I'd rather have the two-drop which can attack and block.
This is true, but I'd argue that Bitter Revelation is 1,000% better in this same situation.
Actually, they do not. The first two happen very, very infrequently. The second happens maybe 25% of the time.
Again, I'll say it. Regardless what your anecdotal experience has been in FNM, about 1 in 30 draws happen as you describe in situation one. As for Limited deck construction, that's an argument for playing literally any card, so I'll ignore it. And #3 might happen in games where players are playing lots of suboptimal cards, but it happens much more infrequently in games where both players have built strong decks.
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First of all, that is slow. Small differences in the average number of turns are more impactful than they looks. As another reference point, the average game length of M14, which was notorious for being so slow that draw spells were first picks, was just a little higher at 10.1 turns.
Second, that assumes you have no prior knowledge about your deck and your opponent's. Some matchups are going to be slower than others, and you could side this in if you need some late game virtual card advantage and don't mind that it's as slow as molasses. Early game I don't like it because you don't have as much junk to dump (unless your deck is junk). But being insurance for borderline hands and dark ritual for delve spells are pretty narrow but OK side benefits.
Finally, those turn numbers are for draft, and draft is faster than sealed. I'd be more likely to consider boarding it in sealed than draft, especially because maybe you just didn't open Bitter Revelation or whatever. But again, probably it chills in the sideboard for most matchups.
My main problem with the card is that the 'delve deck' isn't really a thing. The more you try to turn delve into a combo with a high count of delve cards and some number of enablers instead of just playing regular quality curve out limited and having stuff wind up in the graveyard as a natural consequence of play to fuel a modest number of delve cards you too often wind up with the wrong ratio of enablers to delve cards and they both then become incredibly bad for you if you draw them out of order. Also self decking can be a real concern especially with grindier long game focused decks which are sultai's specialty. On it's own merits outside trying to delve combo it's just kinda underwhelming, id rather cast any basic 2 mana bear on 2 if they were both in my hand and castable and if you want a later card advantage blue spell there's normally no shortage of weave fates and treasure cruises getting passed.
Crystal Ball was pretty good. Launch Party, Bone Splinters, Peel From Reality, Voyage's End, Blinding Beam, Dampen Thought, Gnaw to the Bone, Icy Blast, Overrun, Calciderm, Cyclonic Rift, Incremental Growth, Hour of Need, Travel Preparations, Feeling of Dread, Silent Departure, Into the Void, Distortion Strike
Interested in Custom Card Creation.
My Cube:Cardinal Custom Cube
A custom version of a third modern masters: MM2019
(filter->rarity to see in set rarity).
It is funny that the defense of Scheming has come to comparing its card disadvantage to Overrun.
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Quite simply, it's a very solid draw in the very late game (if the game goes that long). Scheming showing Wetland Sambar, Island, UW lifeland, Efreet Weaponmaster, Treasure Cruise is a huge, huge blowout - your next turn is going to be amazing. Even if instead of Cruise you just had another lategame-oriented creature, your Scheming has significantly improved your next two turns by removing a series of dead draws.
If you have Scheming, you are probably favored in a long game.
I do not endorse using it just to turbocharge an early Delve spell unless that spell is likely to win you the game. Just getting a fast 4/4 isn't worth it as you'll just end up getting 2 for 2'ed in combat.
Not that this says anything towards the overall playability of it, but it really is a card of extremes. It's almost like a charm:
-Fix risky land or spell-light opening hand.
-Ritual out an early threat to get critically ahead on tempo.
-On average, bin 2 lands in a top deck war and slightly improve your upcoming threats.
At almost no other time has it looked close to playable. All of these are scenarios that come up a fair bit, but the standard for this format is a midrange war where mana represented is critical. Additionally, mode 2 and mode 3 aren't generally wanted in the same deck.
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UR Melek, Izzet ParagonUR, B Shirei, Shizo's CaretakerB, R Jaya Ballard, Task MageR,RW Tajic, Blade of the LegionRW, UB Lazav, Dimir MastermindUB, UB Circu, Dimir LobotomistUB, RWU Zedruu the GreatheartedRWU, GUBThe MimeoplasmGUB, UGExperiment Kraj UG, WDarien, King of KjeldorW, BMarrow-GnawerB, WBGKarador, Ghost ChieftainWBG, UTeferi, Temporal ArchmageU, GWUDerevi, Empyrial TacticianGWU, RDaretti, Scrap SavantR, UTalrand, Sky SummonerU, GEzuri, Renegade LeaderG, WUBRGReaper KingWUBRG, RGXenagos, God of RevelsRG, CKozilek, Butcher of TruthC, WUBRGGeneral TazriWUBRG, GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
Anyway, I don't have anything more to say on scheming. I don't think people will change their opinion of the card on mere arguing, and my position is not that the card is good, merely that the card is not unplayable.
Imagine if you drew a Bitter Revelation instead. Insert <mindblown> here.
Similarly, if you are play Scheming in a Jeskai deck with your only potential Delve cards being Treasure Cruise and the much rarer Dig Through Time, you are losing that long game since you'll never get to it.
Can we dispense with the myth that Scheming fixing your mana is even a remotely common occurrence? Statistics put the probability of such a scenario as happening in less than 5% of games. Assuming that you even win 60% of those games, you are talking about having to play 100 games to find 3 in which a turn 2 Scheming 'saved you' from a rough draw. So, if you played Scheming in 33 matches, it might fix your so well that one time it is the reason you won a game. Statistics also say that you will probably lose the large majority of your matches in which you cast Scheming, so it's definitely not worth it.
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I'm surprised that I haven't seen anyone with this deck play Cranial Archive yet; it's similar to Scheming in that it's nearly garbage in any other deck, but can really smooth out the weak spots of a "delve deck."
My Decks:
EDH: Sygg, River Cutthroat , Road to Scion
Grimgrin, Corpseborn
Modern: Polytokes
IRL: Progenitus Polymorph , Goblins
Just a friendly reminder that I will drive this car off a bridge
I don't think anyone ITT is picking Scheming over Bitter Revelation, so I don't see your point here. Revelation isn't even the same color. In your Jeskai example it triggers prowess and fixes your next few draws; I can certainly think of worse situations to find yourself in, most of which involve bad top decking.
I've run a singleton twice and it's already fixed my mana once by putting my 4th land second from the top. The 2 lands and a Scheming scenario might be infrequent, but that only weakens the argument, it doesn't discredit it. When evaluating cards you need to think about all stages of the game, early, mid, and late; Scheming improves your odds of a keepable hand, which pushes it toward the playable side.
Pauper: Burn
Modern: Burn
Legacy: Burn
EDH: Marath, Will of the Wild - Ramp/Combo | Anafenza the Foremost - French | Uril, the Miststalker - Voltron | Freyalise, Llanowar's Fury - Goodstuff
Ghost Council of Orzhov - Tokens | Lazav, Dimir Mastermind - Control | Isamaru, Hound of Konda - Tiny Leaders
That isn't too surprising though, any 0 cost enchantment that let you ditch lands late game for a marginal card's effect would almost certainly be playable. Even something that let you do the same thing with Feed the Pack would be playable, I am pretty sure; gaining 5 or 10 life per turn is much, much different than doing it once. The closest I can think of for that in recent times would be trading post, where the 4 life/turn was quite relevant a lot of the time. I mean, trading post did other relevant stuff too, but if it gained 10 life/card it would have definitely been playable with just that ability alone.
EDIT: That does make me wonder if a deck with, like, 6 tiagam's schemings and an Empty the Pits would actually work. The schemings would let you hit more schemings after a certain point, and the empty the pits is strong enough to be worth throwing your whole hand and deck away to power it out. I might try that if I get an empty the pits some time.
Did you ultimately win the game in which you cast it? And as far as parsing terms between 'weaken' and 'discredit,' you are absolutely splitting hairs.
I'm not sure you understand the concept of 'all stages' the way you think you do, because Scheming is horrible in the mid-game, horrible when you are losing, and horrible when you are winning.
Furthermore, you can argue anecdotes against statistics all you want, but Scheming might improve your draw in 3%-5% of games. In an 18-land deck, you have a 57% chance to have a 3-4 land hand and you would much rather have threats and answers in those hands. Scheming isn't going to make you keep a 0, 1, or 6-land hand, so you're left with it improving the draws of 2 and 5-land hands. This happens roughly 33% of the time. Let's say you have a 5 lander. You therefore have 2 nonland cards, and one of those two has to be Scheming and not the other 21 cards in your deck. That's so rare it's not even worth mentioning. So we are left with the ~22% chance that you have a 2-land hand. Now let's add in the variable of having Scheming as one of your 5 spells. Then add the fact that one of your 2 lands must produce U mana. Again, this will happen so rarely that it's not worth discussing.
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I'm curious what brew of characteristics leads to this, because I can't personally empathize. To me, I love identifying a card that is bad in theory, bad in personal small sample size, and bad in data like Goldfish. "This is great," I think, "because I can completely ignore this card and free up more thinking space for meaningful decisions." I actively want to put card in the trash bin. I don't really care if maybe it should be the 23rd card of my deck 1% of the time because I want to focus on much more relevant issues at hand. By the midpoint of a format, I don't even really see the bad cards anymore. They fade into the background.
Others behave in the opposite way -- grasping for any reason to not discard the card. Bristling at the slur "unplayable." It really feels like an emotional element is involved. It's White Knight'ing for Magic cards. "If I defend this card's honor, it will reward me with secret tech wins at FNM!"
That would be hilarious, but depending on what they're doing, you might be able to kill them through that by waiting an extra turn, going for 14 zombies at end of turn 6 and killing them in a single attack. This is more likely to work against decks that play Death Frenzy because they are less likely to be able to pressure you into needing to do something before turn 6 to avoid dying. I would be more worried about countermagic or fast aggro starts that can kill you by turn 5, honestly. Still, I feel like it could be a limited combo deck, which I always enjoy. They don't come along very often, but I liked playing Havoc Festival+Explosive Impact in Return to Ravnica and Reality Spasm+Echo Mage in Rise of the Eldrazi, so I feel like I might have to try this if given the chance.
The game in question happened weeks ago, so I don't remember the outcome, or even which match it was in; I'm only able to recall that casting in detail because I can refer back to my post on page 1. I've won after casting it and lost after casting it.
You keep insisting that it's horrible in all phases, but you haven't given any convincing arguments. You have, however, resorted to making up an imaginary version of the card that's worse in almost every situation and told us about how good some other cards that everyone knows are good are. No one is out to prove that this is a high pick or format staple. It's on the right side of the playable line and is a relevant late pick that's generally available in triple Khans. No one is arguing that the drawbacks, particularly the card disadvantage, are negligible. The argument is that the benefits outweigh them, at least enough to justify running the card. That's not exactly a high bar.
@phyrre56
I'm not in the habit of forcing bad cards. In fact not too long ago I was on the other side concerning this very card and the only reason that changed was that it happened to be in my draft pool during a week that I had an unusably large glut of delve cards. Turns out my instinctive disdain of this card was unwarranted and that's why I revived this thread. I did not expect a fringe playable to be so controversial, but there's been some good analysis at various points so I think it's a good thing (kind of wish the Scheming v Scout question had gotten more attention).
Throwing around pejorative terms like white knight, even if you qualify it like you did, demonstrates that you're incapable of supporting your position with reasoned arguments. If there are still any arguments about the card that haven't come out yet I'd like to see them, but let's not stray from talking about Scheming and its usefulness in Khans limited.
Pauper: Burn
Modern: Burn
Legacy: Burn
EDH: Marath, Will of the Wild - Ramp/Combo | Anafenza the Foremost - French | Uril, the Miststalker - Voltron | Freyalise, Llanowar's Fury - Goodstuff
Ghost Council of Orzhov - Tokens | Lazav, Dimir Mastermind - Control | Isamaru, Hound of Konda - Tiny Leaders