I appreciate all the quick replies, in particular to the wand problem because that was the only one I wasnt entirely sure i was right on. You guys rock and I'll definitely be making a return to this forum in case I have any rulings questions. Have a nice day ya'll.
Well I'm only about 6 months into magic. Never played before that but I do extensive reading on rulings of different cards and situations, and I even have an app that offers a comprehensive rules list because I don't really enjoy games where you can just stretch rules and whatnot. As a result the guys I play with are often pissed at me because I presume to tell them that they're wrong on an issue or something. So most recently we all gathered together to play a few rounds and things got out of hand as only nerds can do, and we all got into a shouting match because they were playing some questionable moves. If I could get some help with these rulings I'd appreciate it because they aren't easily phrased and searched through Google.
1. The first mistake of the day was one guy would keep casting instant cards that do damage to my creature such as shock, when I had the creature token summoned by Grove of the Guardian. He would only do so in order to lessen my power, not my toughness, and so if I was attacking him he claimed he only took 6 damage instead of 8. I plan to show these rulings to them so can somebody state whether shock deals damage to the toughness of a creature, and not its power?
2. Secondly, that same player had played a harbor serpent and understood that he only had 3 islands and one lonely sandbar. Still I reminded him that that sandbar did not qualify as an island and at that point one of the other guys came over cause he was watching a movie a few feet from us, and he starts saying that anything that produces ISLAND mana counts as an island. Things got out of hand because I told him island was a land subtype and he insisted that it was the name of the mana, and that you put one island counter for each blue mana you have. Is that correct?
3. Lastly all during the same game, my opponent plays a Sphinx-Bone Wand and plays like 5 instant spells to make him draw cards and such, and I attack him with my elemental token from grove. He then tries his instants reduce power thing again, and then after he just "gives up" arguing with me, unleashes all his damage from the wand at me for game. I told him he couldn't do that. He had to play a spell to activate the damage effect, and he said I was stupid because they wouldn't make a card that dealt damage cumulatively. I told him that was the point. Cast 4 cheap spells, then burn for 10 damage from that. So the question here is, does he have to declare the damage that wand does, in order for it to occur, or am I supposed to take damage automatically? And if he does have to declare the damage, can he do so after a whole combat phase has happened and he hasn't played any spells this main phase.
4. Lastly, this is just a question I have because the guy who was watching the movie insisted that we should all just use 2 dice, one to keep track of our life, and one to keep track of our opponents. He basically said you use the die for your opponents life in order to declare damage to them without saying it, since he made this up in response to the bone wand incident. He then insisted that that's how they do it at tournaments. Each player has separate dice for them and their opponent. My question is whether this is true? I say it isn't because at a tournament, a judge would remind or tell a player that damage is being done by an effect or something and that they should reduce their life count.
I thank everyone in advance and please give me some answers because I need these guys to stop being so stupid. In addition, if someone can give me a website or a source where I could call or ask for snap rulings so that I don't have to wait for a forum post in the middle of a game, I'd really appreciate it.
Next time please make one thread for each topic instead of throwing several unrelated questions into one thread. -Carsten
I'm largely confident I can get hold of fetch and shock lands, but I'm not on a terribly large budget. Across two weeks I have about 40 I can safely spend on Magic without worrying about donating blood to make ends meet. Heh . What do you mean by the more aggressive crab version? As in a deck version with the crabs as a key milling element with less field removal to prevent destroying them, or is there a better crab that has a related effect? I think I'd probably go with Quarter than exile. Exile is definitely better but it also requires a complete color shift because I really don't wanna splash a third color in there and have too few of any spells. Come to think, I could do an Azorius theme from ravnica and return to ravnica. The new detain oughta keep me alive for some more turns. And I'll keep the main cards I need such as trap, exile, crabs. Should I keep the phantasms or banks though?
I did like the combo but I was sure that it was too slow to actually do in a professional match. I also didn't know that there were large varieties of lands in most decks. In that case then mill and disruption will be my focus. I appreciate the suggestions and I do like the idea of Archive Trap. Throwing in a haunting echoes after that is just icing on the cake.
As far as hand disruption, wouldn't a few hypnotic specters work out better than adding 5-8 of those other options? I'm definitely adding mutilate, and a couple damnations are handy as well.
In regards to a draw engine, are there any better options than see beyond? I love telling time because I find that more often than not, in 3 cards, there are 2 i could use now and one that just doesn't belong right then. Sleight of Hand seems like a weaker telling time and I'm iffy about visions because it's sorcery speed. So what other options are powerful enough, or preferably, give me advantage while hurting my opponent like Thought Scour?
I'm also gonna add some Tamiyo's since the focus of the deck has shifted.
P.S. Thanks to everybody for such speedy replies. Things weren't so quick in other forums. And thank you Tom for placing my post the appropriate area.
Well this is the first time that I'm posting so if I get the posting format wrong or something to that extent please let me know. I've lightly tested this deck mostly against somewhat defensive decks aubt I have faced against agressive vampires and some aggro green. So far I'm at 8-6 with most of those wins coming from the version that I'm posting now. It features more lands in order to bring out my threats and creatures faster and a more focused look on what I want to play, as opposed to before where I faced mana shortages and counter cards that just weren't helping me out. Anyways here's the list:
Creatures -- 12
4x Fog Bank
4x Jace's Phantasm
4x Hedron Crab
Enchantments -- 4
4x Wind Zendikon
Sorceries -- 15
4x Eradicate
4x Mind Funeral
4x See Beyond
3x Fabricate
The basic idea of the deck is to throw down some hedron crabs to mill as I drop lands, with phantasms and banks as blocking support. Once I get to 4 mana I'll have enchanted an opponents key land with zendikon. Then I can Eradicate it and cripple a large part of their mana base since Eradicate checks for card names, not types. If they run multiple colors I'll repeat the process for the others while constantly milling with hedron and destroying most of their deck with mind funeral due to land shortage.
In the event that my opponent's deck is too fast, I'll remove the zendikons and such that focus around that strategy and bring in most of the sideboard with scepters allowing me to imprint on mana leak or sorin's thirst for some damage, or telling time for deck control.
My main concerns are whether this is viable in modern. I've never played a sanctioned Magic event, just casually with friends, but I'd like to know whether this deck could be fast enough to create a threat in Modern, and if so, what cards should I add to increase the speed. As far as I can tell this deck should be playable in modern. All the cards are from acceptable sets and I don't have any banned cards now.
Any suggestions or critiques are welcome, especially anything that can help me bring out my mind funerals, eradicates, and zendikons out faster. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you
1. The first mistake of the day was one guy would keep casting instant cards that do damage to my creature such as shock, when I had the creature token summoned by Grove of the Guardian. He would only do so in order to lessen my power, not my toughness, and so if I was attacking him he claimed he only took 6 damage instead of 8. I plan to show these rulings to them so can somebody state whether shock deals damage to the toughness of a creature, and not its power?
2. Secondly, that same player had played a harbor serpent and understood that he only had 3 islands and one lonely sandbar. Still I reminded him that that sandbar did not qualify as an island and at that point one of the other guys came over cause he was watching a movie a few feet from us, and he starts saying that anything that produces ISLAND mana counts as an island. Things got out of hand because I told him island was a land subtype and he insisted that it was the name of the mana, and that you put one island counter for each blue mana you have. Is that correct?
3. Lastly all during the same game, my opponent plays a Sphinx-Bone Wand and plays like 5 instant spells to make him draw cards and such, and I attack him with my elemental token from grove. He then tries his instants reduce power thing again, and then after he just "gives up" arguing with me, unleashes all his damage from the wand at me for game. I told him he couldn't do that. He had to play a spell to activate the damage effect, and he said I was stupid because they wouldn't make a card that dealt damage cumulatively. I told him that was the point. Cast 4 cheap spells, then burn for 10 damage from that. So the question here is, does he have to declare the damage that wand does, in order for it to occur, or am I supposed to take damage automatically? And if he does have to declare the damage, can he do so after a whole combat phase has happened and he hasn't played any spells this main phase.
4. Lastly, this is just a question I have because the guy who was watching the movie insisted that we should all just use 2 dice, one to keep track of our life, and one to keep track of our opponents. He basically said you use the die for your opponents life in order to declare damage to them without saying it, since he made this up in response to the bone wand incident. He then insisted that that's how they do it at tournaments. Each player has separate dice for them and their opponent. My question is whether this is true? I say it isn't because at a tournament, a judge would remind or tell a player that damage is being done by an effect or something and that they should reduce their life count.
I thank everyone in advance and please give me some answers because I need these guys to stop being so stupid. In addition, if someone can give me a website or a source where I could call or ask for snap rulings so that I don't have to wait for a forum post in the middle of a game, I'd really appreciate it.
Next time please make one thread for each topic instead of throwing several unrelated questions into one thread. -Carsten
As far as hand disruption, wouldn't a few hypnotic specters work out better than adding 5-8 of those other options? I'm definitely adding mutilate, and a couple damnations are handy as well.
In regards to a draw engine, are there any better options than see beyond? I love telling time because I find that more often than not, in 3 cards, there are 2 i could use now and one that just doesn't belong right then. Sleight of Hand seems like a weaker telling time and I'm iffy about visions because it's sorcery speed. So what other options are powerful enough, or preferably, give me advantage while hurting my opponent like Thought Scour?
I'm also gonna add some Tamiyo's since the focus of the deck has shifted.
P.S. Thanks to everybody for such speedy replies. Things weren't so quick in other forums. And thank you Tom for placing my post the appropriate area.
Creatures -- 12
4x Fog Bank
4x Jace's Phantasm
4x Hedron Crab
Enchantments -- 4
4x Wind Zendikon
Sorceries -- 15
4x Eradicate
4x Mind Funeral
4x See Beyond
3x Fabricate
Instants -- 7
4x Telling Time
3x Mana Leak
Artifacts -- 3
3x Gilded Lotus
Lands -- 22
3x Dimir Aqueduct
9x Swamp
10x Island
Sideboard -- 15
4x Isochron Scepter
4x Mind Sculpt
4x Sorin's Thirst
3x Sadistic Sacrament
Total Count is 63 cards
The basic idea of the deck is to throw down some hedron crabs to mill as I drop lands, with phantasms and banks as blocking support. Once I get to 4 mana I'll have enchanted an opponents key land with zendikon. Then I can Eradicate it and cripple a large part of their mana base since Eradicate checks for card names, not types. If they run multiple colors I'll repeat the process for the others while constantly milling with hedron and destroying most of their deck with mind funeral due to land shortage.
In the event that my opponent's deck is too fast, I'll remove the zendikons and such that focus around that strategy and bring in most of the sideboard with scepters allowing me to imprint on mana leak or sorin's thirst for some damage, or telling time for deck control.
My main concerns are whether this is viable in modern. I've never played a sanctioned Magic event, just casually with friends, but I'd like to know whether this deck could be fast enough to create a threat in Modern, and if so, what cards should I add to increase the speed. As far as I can tell this deck should be playable in modern. All the cards are from acceptable sets and I don't have any banned cards now.
Any suggestions or critiques are welcome, especially anything that can help me bring out my mind funerals, eradicates, and zendikons out faster. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you