If you had a way to cheat the tyrant into play, you could port the locket of yesteryears/Sensei's Divining Top combo to completely bounce the opponent's side of the board. Also, to get infinite storm count, the tyrant seems really slow, esp compared to the aforementioned LoY/SDT combo.
I'll add the caveat that I haven't done as much drafting with FS as I have with sets before it. That being said I play at a store with 10-15 players with ratings 1700-1850 in limited. We draft (usually 8-man, but with the occasional 4 and 6-man) about three nights a week. Amongst this crew the draft decks are tightly focused and quick for the throat. Within that environment I greatly prefer the Archer, although I find Nessian Courier and the empath are closely behind. Sprout Swarm is, generally, "bad" because paying the buyback should rarely be the optimal play. Regardless, my drafting is done to optimize my chances amongst this playgroup.
IF you're ever in Dayton, Ohio hit us up Sat and Mon nights and the occasional FNM.
Sprout Swarm is amazing in sealed, substantially less so in draft. Draft, for the four non-green colors, is all about evasion. Getting a "free" 1/1 to block is thus not amazing as it in sealed where evasion is a total premium. Moreover, draft is much faster, esp in TS block. Sprou Swarm is almost jank in draft unless you have a stout thallid deck that can use "free" saprolings.
The archer strikes me as the best green common for draft. Its efficient and can cause a stall by holding it back to trade with their better and more expensive creature. Courier is stout as well.
Was thinking for a bit, and began to imagine how tremendouly effective pact of negation could be in zoo. To negate the "losing the game" effect, you could combo it with angel's grace. Jank? Maybe. But imagine some of these scenarios:
You've got 3 guys on the field, swinging in for the win next turn. Your control opponent has a wrath of god in his hand (they always do). They...cast it. Game Over. Or; They tap out to play it, Pact of negation, angel's grace, swing for 10 gg.
Your aggro opponent has the same if not slightly better board position as you. The game is going nowhere fast, and it's better to win quickly rather than lose slowly (duh). You make an alpha strike, forcing your opponent to make some careful blocks, while possibly luring him to make his own alpha strike next turn. He does, and taps out for burn and you angel's grace. Next turn, you untap, swing ftw.
It's late game and your opponent is delicately maintaining a spell burst lock. In order to get him tapped out, you let loose a couple of spells you've been holding back for the past few turns. For your last, you let loose that lethal lightning helix or char; your opponent goes to tap for remand or spell burst again, but you pact of negation - not even requiring an angel's grace because you've already won.
So, not only does pact of negation + angel's grace provide AGGRO of all decks a Force of Will, the components are also extremely versatile simply by themselves. I've seen a couple games with this manouever already, and it's almost always extremely effective. Thoughts?
1. Zoo doesn't have any slots to give up for Pacts and Graces.
2. The Pact is worthless without Grace...unless... you eff up Zoo's already mangled mana base.
3. The Pact (and generally Grace) is only good once you've established your board position. I'd rather have a proactive card in an aggro deck.
I would like to see this deck list alot. Since one of my decks is Project X. Ive already planned on putting Bitter Ordeal in tehre as a one or two of. Seems to me being able to remove thier library from the game around turn 4 or 5 if needed is a great back up game plan.
I've seen more developed lists but I don't remember where. One difference is that the better versions have Flame-kins. They fishbowl to infinite Zombies pretty quickly.
So I need that third island to play Teferi and I draw River of Tears. yeah I'm crying now cuz it produces black, not blue mana the turn I play it. So I'd say it doesn't reliably produce blue mana.
Teferi has flash, if you're playing Teferi on your turn (as opposed to their EoT) you're probably a bad player. River of Tears does not affect ability to cast Teferi.
Has no one on this site posted the Dredge/Project X hybrid deck that runs bridge? It gets infinite zombie tokens consistently turn 3-4 and can go off turn 2 with a god draw and dredge. It's also far more stout than Narco because it runs Svogthos and Trolls as backup win conditions and can get infinite life in a pinch.
Sensei's Divining Top is not going to happen. It slows the game too much (1, look, put them back). I think the power level is about right, I don't think that flavour really matters that much in a core set, so I don't see any other reason for it not to be reprinted. But it really slows the game down (1, look, put them back). I don't think that powerful, cheap, repeatable top of the library manipulation is something that Wizards really wants. It creates design constraints, but I think they're surmountable. But it slows down the game (1, look, put them back). It also creates a boring situation with one player or the other keeping doing the same thing, over and over every turn that gets really old, really quickly (1, look, put them back). Did I mention that it keeps repeating and slows down the game? (1, look, put them back)
Additionally, putting top into X is going to make peple try to create the Locket of yesterdays storm combo in standard. Which can be really dumb and may be competitive in standard.
With the information presented, you have to cast the brute force and play for the win. Assuming Lightning Axe is his only out and how he has played has not given you any clue as to whether he actually holds it, the odds dictate you Brute Force. Since it's midgame, let us assume he has twenty cards remaining in his library. The odds of him holding the Axe are then 1/22 plus 1/21. That means he has an approximately 9.3% chance of having the Axe. Your odds of winning outright, again assuming this is his only out, are 90.7%!That is substantially better than the presumably 50/50 odds of a fourth game. Your odds are actually better than that in all liklihood, since he probably had more than 20 cards remaining in his deck. If has more outs, say a bounce or counter spell, the odds probably are still in your favor.
I guess the only additional information needed is did he Scry any? Cause, let's say he cast Foresee and sent four cards to the bottom of his twenty card library. Presumably, none of those four were lightning axe. So the odds he has the axe are now 1/18 plus 1/17. In other words, 11.4%. Really, only a significant change in odds if he has multiple outs. If he has two outs, he has approx. 1/4 chance of winning. Odds still in your favor.
I think she works best with Wildfire and the Bust half of Boom//Bust. Turn 5 or 4 if you have five mana, play her. Opp's EoT, suspend big threat. Next turn Wildfire or Bust. Then, run counters and burn to stop opponent's strategy.
I think Jhoira works best in an Armageddon style deck. Play the Bust half of Boom//Bust while you have a strong creature suspened until then just counter/kill everything they put out. May also work in a Wildfire deck as well (or even better since it likely clears the board). Aeon Chronicler slides right in to dig for pieces or just gain raw card advantage. Detritivore in the sideboard against non-basics.
Might want to include Skirk Ridge Exhumer. It enables dredge and can hose aggro and help pay the flashback on dread return. May be too slow at 1B, but bears testing I think.
Anyone else see the dominance of this card in sealed. It may be 10x better in 2HG sealed but man this thing gave us 3+x the card advantage or tons of damage nearly every time he swung.
I think its in the top 3 of the uncommons in current limited. If they can't remove him before he swings once unless they have 0-1 creatures its almost game breaking.
Obviously not many decks can accommodate the heavy green commitment but think its more likely in a draft or what happens to be a heavy green deck with plenty of land search.
Had him in my sealed pool for the PR. I ended up 10th out of 190+ players going 5-0-2. This guy was a house and rapidly unclogged stalled boards. I also had Primal Forcemage. Twice today I had both out at the same time. Getting a 6/6 beater for each creature the opponent has is absolutely savage. Also, even though I didn't have it in my pool, I imagine he plays really well with Strength in numbers. I would rate Nacatl War-Pride as the best green uncommon in FS. Only problem is the triple G mana cost.
I think Gravestorm is only permanents put into the graveyard from play, so you'd need a second Wild Cantor or something, but it should still be pretty easy to pull off. As for other angels, you've got the four mentioned so far plus Razia, Boros Archangel. Firemane Angel and Lightning Angel aren't strong enough for this, and probably not Adarkar Valkyrie either. With this plan, I'd want to run five power and up ones, to ensure a win in two attacks.
Right but the Cantor goes the yard, so you get the spell itself and one copy off the Cantor, so you fetch up two Angels of Despair. Obviously works better off the draw since then you don't have to blow up one of your own lands. Of course, I'd probably run one Razia for the hasty beats. Oh snap, Akroma! You could get both Akromas out on turn two! That's some spicy beats for standard, if they don't have a blocker or removal they die turn three if they take any pain off their land, or you have an additional red mana source beyond the mountain. EDIT: Or you could have pushed through for one with the Cantor. No worries about removal because the Angelstorm is an instant. Alright, I have got to stop thinking about this card, it would just be too good.
Missed that part. Guess I'm more tired than I thought. Anyway, it still wouldn't reward you too much for playing Angel of Salvation over, let's say, Angel of Despair or either Akroma.
Dang, yeah Despair is way better. Also, see the combo I posted above. You get that off and get two Angels of Despair out that's auto GG. What other Angels are worth running in T2? I'm praying this miraculously ends up the last White card we are missing.
IF you're ever in Dayton, Ohio hit us up Sat and Mon nights and the occasional FNM.
Sprout Swarm is amazing in sealed, substantially less so in draft. Draft, for the four non-green colors, is all about evasion. Getting a "free" 1/1 to block is thus not amazing as it in sealed where evasion is a total premium. Moreover, draft is much faster, esp in TS block. Sprou Swarm is almost jank in draft unless you have a stout thallid deck that can use "free" saprolings.
The archer strikes me as the best green common for draft. Its efficient and can cause a stall by holding it back to trade with their better and more expensive creature. Courier is stout as well.
1. Zoo doesn't have any slots to give up for Pacts and Graces.
2. The Pact is worthless without Grace...unless... you eff up Zoo's already mangled mana base.
3. The Pact (and generally Grace) is only good once you've established your board position. I'd rather have a proactive card in an aggro deck.
There is an early list available here: http://bellbcomic.com/phpbb2/viewtopic.php?t=643
I've seen more developed lists but I don't remember where. One difference is that the better versions have Flame-kins. They fishbowl to infinite Zombies pretty quickly.
Teferi has flash, if you're playing Teferi on your turn (as opposed to their EoT) you're probably a bad player. River of Tears does not affect ability to cast Teferi.
Additionally, putting top into X is going to make peple try to create the Locket of yesterdays storm combo in standard. Which can be really dumb and may be competitive in standard.
I guess the only additional information needed is did he Scry any? Cause, let's say he cast Foresee and sent four cards to the bottom of his twenty card library. Presumably, none of those four were lightning axe. So the odds he has the axe are now 1/18 plus 1/17. In other words, 11.4%. Really, only a significant change in odds if he has multiple outs. If he has two outs, he has approx. 1/4 chance of winning. Odds still in your favor.
Had him in my sealed pool for the PR. I ended up 10th out of 190+ players going 5-0-2. This guy was a house and rapidly unclogged stalled boards. I also had Primal Forcemage. Twice today I had both out at the same time. Getting a 6/6 beater for each creature the opponent has is absolutely savage. Also, even though I didn't have it in my pool, I imagine he plays really well with Strength in numbers. I would rate Nacatl War-Pride as the best green uncommon in FS. Only problem is the triple G mana cost.
Right but the Cantor goes the yard, so you get the spell itself and one copy off the Cantor, so you fetch up two Angels of Despair. Obviously works better off the draw since then you don't have to blow up one of your own lands. Of course, I'd probably run one Razia for the hasty beats. Oh snap, Akroma! You could get both Akromas out on turn two! That's some spicy beats for standard, if they don't have a blocker or removal they die turn three if they take any pain off their land, or you have an additional red mana source beyond the mountain. EDIT: Or you could have pushed through for one with the Cantor. No worries about removal because the Angelstorm is an instant. Alright, I have got to stop thinking about this card, it would just be too good.
Dang, yeah Despair is way better. Also, see the combo I posted above. You get that off and get two Angels of Despair out that's auto GG. What other Angels are worth running in T2? I'm praying this miraculously ends up the last White card we are missing.