That was sort of what I was thinking. Also 3 converted mana for a flying 3/3 that you can pump with counters (I would definitely have a Doubling Season) is pretty awesome. People that don't pay much close attention to her might let me spank them with commander damage a few times before they realize what is up.
Riku of Two Reflections is a really fun build that can get insane in the late game. The red helps with things like board sweeps if things get too out of control.
Yeah, I've seen some really awesome Riku decks. A lot of my friends have one, not as many as Edric so I'd be more open to him as a commander.
I just recently got back into Magic and am really enjoying myself. Its been probably around 15 years since I played but some of the newer formats and cards are just amazing.
I've mostly just been playing EDH since I restarted but I've recently been looking into branching out into other formats.
The first deck I built since restarting was an Anowon, the Ruin Sage EDH deck (obviously tribal vampire). Since then I've built a Thraximundar deck whose basic win condition is making Thraxi huge with sacrifices and protecting him with U denial.
I just recently rebuilt the Anowon, mono B deck into a tribal vampire deck with Garza Zol as the Commander for the colors (UBR) because I wanted some denial in there and wanted to add Olivia Voldaren (who I firmly believe is the best vampire ever).
Now I'm looking to build some kind of control deck.
Anyway I'm looking forward to becoming a regular on the forums and thank you in advance for any and all help you guys provide.
So I only recently got back into MTG. I used to play way back in the mid to late '90s so some of these formats and a lot of the cards are pretty new to me (back when I played most creatures stronger then 5/5 had crazy mana costs or some ability that hurt you more then helped)
So as I got back into the game friends have introduced me to EDH which is mostly all I play now. Since I was getting back into the game and figuring out what cards are good and how things work together it was easy for me to run B, R and U decks (in various combinations) heavy on creatures. Since all that is pretty straight forward.
Now that I think I'm figuring out things a little more I really want to make a GU control deck (would also be open to a third color) that has some fun and somewhat complex win conditions to it.
I've compiled a list of some commanders I'm interested in and would like to hear thoughts on them and suggestions for any others (one rule: No Edric, Spymaster of Trest...he is a great card and an amazing commander but all my friends run him and I want something unique).
So a friend of mine introduced me to the Zombie horde mode a few weeks back (if you don't know its basically a 100 card automated Zombie deck made up of mostly tokens with some special rules about how cards play. Several players work together as a team and you win if you survive until the zombie deck runs out of cards).
So I spread it around to some other friends and we started to experiment with a spin-off of the format.
Basically its Emperor but the "Emperor" is a token deck similar to the zombie deck. The team health is the number of cards in your Emperor deck (we lowered it to 80 from the 100 in Zombie Horde). We've tried coming up with a bunch of different rules to even out the imbalances between various forms of tokens and created dice roll rules for deciding how to deal with things like Flashback, Scavange and other abilities.
For instance, Zombies have haste and always have to attack. While Soldiers roll dice or flip coins to decide if they attack or stay back to defend. Also, each token type has different rules about how they move from the Emperor's "control" to other players control. In zombie horde you always assume the zombie deck has infinite mana and uses it. You do the same with this but that can cause some problems with flashback, scavange and unearth type cards so we decided that each rule like that would have a dice roll associated with it. For instance to see if you hit a flashback you roll a D-12 (might have been D-20) and if you roll at or above the flashback cost then the automated deck casts it. You only do this once. You do not continuously re-roll each turn for every flashback, scavange, unearth in your graveyard.
We've also had to fiddle around with "sphere of influence" stuff in the Emperor format to find the best way of balancing everything out.
We only did one test run of the format and still hadn't come up with most of the rules we are going to need to make it work but the game went amazingly well.
It was a Zombie Emperor vs. Soldier Emperor and the Soldiers were really holding their own until the Zombies hit an Army of the Damned and then hit the dice roll that we determined would trigger its flashback cost (meaning 26 2/2 zombies came onto the board!).
Anyway, I didn't keep the rules list we came up with so I can't give you guys much more info about the format. I was just wondering if it sounded interesting to anyone else and if they had any suggestions about how to improve the format.
EDIT: Looking now I think this thread maybe belonged in the "Homebrew" forum...My apologies to mods if they end up having to move this where it belongs.
I love the idea of Kaalia decks but there is one huge problem with her:
EVERYONE KNOWS KAALIA!
Everyone knows that if you let Kaalia come on the board and you give her a couple turns its very hard to beat her (especially if some combination of Avacyn, Angel of Hope, Aurelia, the Warleader and Akroma, Angel of Wrath comes out with the first few Kaalia drops).
So the second you break out your Kaalia deck you are the target of everyone in the game. In heads up that doesn't matter as much but in a multi-player game it makes it very hard to win with Kaalia. Everyone is going to gang up on you to make sure Kaalia never hits the board or is removed very quickly if she does.
I find the most successful Kaalia decks to be ones that can consistently get her out turn 3 (possible with things like the guild signets) with something like Lightning Greaves.
Otherwise, I find the best Kaalia decks to be ones that only have a very limited number of angels, demons and dragons and a lot of other small creatures combined with protection for the big buys and deck search to find them when you need them.
They don't just work well together...They are an infinite loop win condition. I have them in my Vamp tribal deck but I don't like actually playing both cards in a friendly game (we frown on infy loops among my main group of friends).
OT: I used to run my vamp tribal as mono black but found that there are a lot of limitations to doing so. Especially if people have a deck with a lot of pro-black. Control decks also are a problem against mono vamps because they can do a good job of preventing you from getting your creatures out. Since the win condition for most tribal decks is getting creatures out that can be a problem.
So I've started using a UBR Vampire deck with Garza Zol, Plague Queen as the Commander. The U let's me run denial and card draw, while the B and R let me run a bunch of removal.
The Bloodlord of Vaasgoth is great because he can give all your creatures Bloodthirst 3 if you do things right. So if you have the Captivating out, the Lord of Lineage out and make sure you summon a creature after doing combat damage it automatically is +6/+6 in addition to its normal power and toughness the second you summon it. Plus then you can get a +2/+1 from the Nocturnus if you have a top deck black card showing.
So, basically I've given you all the creatures I run...lol
I find Grave Pact to be incredible with the deck along with other cards previously mentioned like Blade of the Bloodchief and the Izzet, Dimir and Rakdos special lands. Also, I'm of the opinion that Necropotence is a must in all decks that have B. In a vampire deck that has a ton of lifelink it is even better because you don't have to worry as much about taking the damage to draw cards. Getting it out with a Reliquary Tower can be dominating.
I'd love to be able to run the WB vampires because all 3 (Vish Kal, Blood Arbiter, Tithe Drinker and Blood Baron of Vizkopa) are absolutely nasty. One day I make a Vish Kal deck but then I won't be able to run creatures like Olivia.
That was sort of what I was thinking. Also 3 converted mana for a flying 3/3 that you can pump with counters (I would definitely have a Doubling Season) is pretty awesome. People that don't pay much close attention to her might let me spank them with commander damage a few times before they realize what is up.
Momir Vig, Simic Visionary?
Looks awesome. Especially if I want to use a bunch of elves (or just go full tribal) for mana ramping.
Yeah, I've seen some really awesome Riku decks. A lot of my friends have one, not as many as Edric so I'd be more open to him as a commander.
I just recently got back into Magic and am really enjoying myself. Its been probably around 15 years since I played but some of the newer formats and cards are just amazing.
I've mostly just been playing EDH since I restarted but I've recently been looking into branching out into other formats.
The first deck I built since restarting was an Anowon, the Ruin Sage EDH deck (obviously tribal vampire). Since then I've built a Thraximundar deck whose basic win condition is making Thraxi huge with sacrifices and protecting him with U denial.
I just recently rebuilt the Anowon, mono B deck into a tribal vampire deck with Garza Zol as the Commander for the colors (UBR) because I wanted some denial in there and wanted to add Olivia Voldaren (who I firmly believe is the best vampire ever).
Now I'm looking to build some kind of control deck.
Anyway I'm looking forward to becoming a regular on the forums and thank you in advance for any and all help you guys provide.
So as I got back into the game friends have introduced me to EDH which is mostly all I play now. Since I was getting back into the game and figuring out what cards are good and how things work together it was easy for me to run B, R and U decks (in various combinations) heavy on creatures. Since all that is pretty straight forward.
Now that I think I'm figuring out things a little more I really want to make a GU control deck (would also be open to a third color) that has some fun and somewhat complex win conditions to it.
I've compiled a list of some commanders I'm interested in and would like to hear thoughts on them and suggestions for any others (one rule: No Edric, Spymaster of Trest...he is a great card and an amazing commander but all my friends run him and I want something unique).
Here is a list of some of my thoughts:
Animar, Soul of Elements
Damia, Sage of Stone
Experiment Kraj
Intet, the Dreamer
Jenara, Asura of War
Maelstrom Wanderer
Prime Speaker Zegana
Rubinia Soulsinger
Vorosh, the Hunter
So I spread it around to some other friends and we started to experiment with a spin-off of the format.
Basically its Emperor but the "Emperor" is a token deck similar to the zombie deck. The team health is the number of cards in your Emperor deck (we lowered it to 80 from the 100 in Zombie Horde). We've tried coming up with a bunch of different rules to even out the imbalances between various forms of tokens and created dice roll rules for deciding how to deal with things like Flashback, Scavange and other abilities.
For instance, Zombies have haste and always have to attack. While Soldiers roll dice or flip coins to decide if they attack or stay back to defend. Also, each token type has different rules about how they move from the Emperor's "control" to other players control. In zombie horde you always assume the zombie deck has infinite mana and uses it. You do the same with this but that can cause some problems with flashback, scavange and unearth type cards so we decided that each rule like that would have a dice roll associated with it. For instance to see if you hit a flashback you roll a D-12 (might have been D-20) and if you roll at or above the flashback cost then the automated deck casts it. You only do this once. You do not continuously re-roll each turn for every flashback, scavange, unearth in your graveyard.
We've also had to fiddle around with "sphere of influence" stuff in the Emperor format to find the best way of balancing everything out.
We only did one test run of the format and still hadn't come up with most of the rules we are going to need to make it work but the game went amazingly well.
It was a Zombie Emperor vs. Soldier Emperor and the Soldiers were really holding their own until the Zombies hit an Army of the Damned and then hit the dice roll that we determined would trigger its flashback cost (meaning 26 2/2 zombies came onto the board!).
Anyway, I didn't keep the rules list we came up with so I can't give you guys much more info about the format. I was just wondering if it sounded interesting to anyone else and if they had any suggestions about how to improve the format.
EDIT: Looking now I think this thread maybe belonged in the "Homebrew" forum...My apologies to mods if they end up having to move this where it belongs.
EVERYONE KNOWS KAALIA!
Everyone knows that if you let Kaalia come on the board and you give her a couple turns its very hard to beat her (especially if some combination of Avacyn, Angel of Hope, Aurelia, the Warleader and Akroma, Angel of Wrath comes out with the first few Kaalia drops).
So the second you break out your Kaalia deck you are the target of everyone in the game. In heads up that doesn't matter as much but in a multi-player game it makes it very hard to win with Kaalia. Everyone is going to gang up on you to make sure Kaalia never hits the board or is removed very quickly if she does.
I find the most successful Kaalia decks to be ones that can consistently get her out turn 3 (possible with things like the guild signets) with something like Lightning Greaves.
Otherwise, I find the best Kaalia decks to be ones that only have a very limited number of angels, demons and dragons and a lot of other small creatures combined with protection for the big buys and deck search to find them when you need them.
They don't just work well together...They are an infinite loop win condition. I have them in my Vamp tribal deck but I don't like actually playing both cards in a friendly game (we frown on infy loops among my main group of friends).
OT: I used to run my vamp tribal as mono black but found that there are a lot of limitations to doing so. Especially if people have a deck with a lot of pro-black. Control decks also are a problem against mono vamps because they can do a good job of preventing you from getting your creatures out. Since the win condition for most tribal decks is getting creatures out that can be a problem.
So I've started using a UBR Vampire deck with Garza Zol, Plague Queen as the Commander. The U let's me run denial and card draw, while the B and R let me run a bunch of removal.
I also get to run a lot of sweet creatures like the Stromkirk Captain, Olivia Voldaron (BEST VAMPIRE EVER), Markov Warlord, Blood Tyrant, Mirko Vosk, Mind Drinker and Szadek, Lord of Secrets (Mirko, Szadek and a few other vamps allow you to add a mill win condition to the deck).
The black only vampires I consider key to the deck are the Bloodline Keeper (transforming him into the Lord of Lineage is almost a win condition on its own), Mirri the Cursed, Anowon, the Ruin Sage, Captivating Vampire, Vampire Nocturnus, Blood Artist, Falkenrath Noble, Blood Seeker (those last three combined with Anowon make a very unpleasant situation for opposing creature decks...the Blood Artist can completely neuter token decks like a Ghave, Guru of Spores deck).
I also like putting a lot of one and two drop creatures like the Pulse Tracker and the Vampire Hexmage along with the Artist and Seeker.
Lifelink vampires like the Vampire Nighthawk and Markov Patrician are awesome and are also cheap drops. Vampires that allow you to sacrifice other creature cards like the Hexmage, the Bloodflow Connoisseur and the Bloodthrone Vampire go great with the Anowon, Artist, Falkenrath combo.
The Bloodlord of Vaasgoth is great because he can give all your creatures Bloodthirst 3 if you do things right. So if you have the Captivating out, the Lord of Lineage out and make sure you summon a creature after doing combat damage it automatically is +6/+6 in addition to its normal power and toughness the second you summon it. Plus then you can get a +2/+1 from the Nocturnus if you have a top deck black card showing.
I also like some big drops and level up creatures like:
Butcher of Malakir, Mephidross Vampire, Necropolis Regent, Nirkana Revenant (also servers to mana ramp your black a little), Sangromancer, Kalitas, Bloodchief of Ghet, Drana, Kalastria Bloodchief, Malakir Bloodwitch and Nirkana Cutthroat
So, basically I've given you all the creatures I run...lol
I find Grave Pact to be incredible with the deck along with other cards previously mentioned like Blade of the Bloodchief and the Izzet, Dimir and Rakdos special lands. Also, I'm of the opinion that Necropotence is a must in all decks that have B. In a vampire deck that has a ton of lifelink it is even better because you don't have to worry as much about taking the damage to draw cards. Getting it out with a Reliquary Tower can be dominating.
I'd love to be able to run the WB vampires because all 3 (Vish Kal, Blood Arbiter, Tithe Drinker and Blood Baron of Vizkopa) are absolutely nasty. One day I make a Vish Kal deck but then I won't be able to run creatures like Olivia.