- toctheyounger77
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Member for 7 years, 5 months, and 12 days
Last active Mon, May, 17 2021 19:48:38
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Jun 10, 2018toctheyounger77 posted a message on Ravnica: The Living GuildpactThe next core set is purported to be set on Tarkir, so the Sarkhan/Ugin thing might be a possibility.Posted in: Articles
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May 21, 2018toctheyounger77 posted a message on Ravnica: The Broken GuildpactFair enough! I guess it just comes across that way in a summary article because there are so many guilds to track through ~1-2 pages of information. I always thought the nephilim would play more of a part, too, considering how unique they are.Posted in: Articles
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May 21, 2018toctheyounger77 posted a message on Ravnica: The Broken GuildpactMan, that was convoluted as hell.Posted in: Articles
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Feb 27, 2018toctheyounger77 posted a message on Time Spiral and the MendingThanks so much Jay. This is the last bit of lore I've really wanted to know for a while. Teferi being one of my favourite characters and wanting to know more about the Mending and 'modern Bolas', this was a great read, and well timed coming into Dominaria.Posted in: Articles
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Sep 27, 2017toctheyounger77 posted a message on Who is the Raven Man?Great article. Long but not unnecessarily. I can pretty well agree with the conclusion too. My first thought was Leshrac, but not knowing a HUGE amount of older lore (I started playing at a young age), Leshrac seems unlikely. Lim-Dul fits the bill. It would be a great twist at some point too.Posted in: Articles
What are the odds the reveal happens in the upcoming Dominaria set next year? Fingers crossed. - To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
There's some extra features I'll be looking at for my primers moving forward. For a great indication of what's possible check out darrenhabib's Will and Rowan Kenrith primer. It's absolutely beautiful.
See the coding guie linked above, anchors are there, they just look a little different.
For sure. I think Thran Turbine is kinda cool for the extra zombie, although it does mean it comes in summoning sick, and it does mean finding a good way to drop cards in your yard - for a super cheap price, Zombie Infestation could go well with it if you end up keeping it. Drop cards for one zombie, exile for another. But yeah, you're right, as flavourful as Endless Ranks of the Dead is, it just sucks for how slow and dependent on board state it is.
I'm well aware, the simple fact is that I don't have a copy, and it's hella expensive for something I'm trying out. Even if this goes well, I'm not convinced I want to spend that much money. Besides, I live in NZ, cards that old aren't easy to get hold of. I was lucky my LGS had a copy of Darkness.
Fair assessment. Again, I have one copy and it's in use. I'm not entirely convinced it's absolutely required here either. Sure, it's very good in general. The fact is that I've had really good success with lower cost zombies curving into Varina and using her draw from there. Aside from that, most of the lists posted in the thread here have a real speed bump at around 5 or 6 mana, which forces a difficult choice; Esper isn't great at ramp unless you have Crypts and Vaults spare, and I just felt like it wasn't AS good a fit as what I have here.
I had both Greaves and boots in here, and they were surplus to requirements 90% of the time. At the time I cast either of these I'd much prefer to be dropping a signet/talisman or a utility zombie for curving into Varina with. The thing is our tokens and janky 2-3 drops are more than the sum of their parts anyway, so I tend not to see a lot of targeting. Wipes, sure - I run a few myself and I'm not afraid to wipe the board if I have an aristocrat on board, sometimes even if I don't. Plus we've got mass reanimation there, so no biggie. And haste, well, like I say, the idea is to curve into Varina anyway, and a lot of the time I'm happy not to swing with Varina anyway - I will if I have to, but her ability doesn't rely on her attacking, so why risk it unless necessary?
It's a free token, sure, but I'm not seeing how Myr Turbine makes zombies....on its own at least. Are you running Arcane Adaptation or Conspiracy with it? Neither of those are things I'm totally keen on personally, but that's cool if it works for you. My preference for token generation is a little different personally. Diregraf Colossus has been great of late, God-Eternal Oketra has done some work, and Zombie Infestation is remarkably decent. And of course, Tombstone Stairwell wrecks face in the most devastating fashion.
Thanks for the suggestions here, feel free to share your thoughts on my justifications here or further suggestions if you like
In:
Scroll Rack
Out:
Wayfarer's Bauble
I've had a copy since Tempest, and always knew well enough to hold onto it. Its synergy with Land Tax is well known, and it's a pure beast for mono white where we struggle for draw and ramp comparatively. I've found with the deck strategically there's a tendency to hold resources for 'just in case', and to some degree it would be nice to have some filtering, purely to keep momentum up when I'm building or aiming for a win. There's very little better in terms of this, and we have pieces to make sure this stays in play too. It should be a great addition.
In:
High Tide
Mind's Desire
2 Island
Out:
Mnemonic Betrayal
Expedition Map
Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
Cabal Coffers
Pleasingly, I have a replacement for Mnemonic Betrayal in Mind's Desire. It's not perfect, in that there's a chance it will hit x spells, but Dralnu can recast them where needed, and theoretically it's a really good alternative to Paradox Engine as a win con, purely because it's nice to have more than one engine in the deck.
I'm trying a few new things here, purely because there's been some discussion around them for and against and I have the opportunity to test them, so why not? Some of this has come from the now defunct Zedruu build, and some I've just added to try out.
In:
Glacial Fortress
Hall of Heliod's Generosity
Talisman of Hierarchy
Alhammarret's Archive
Infernal Darkness
Beacon of Unrest
Agent of Erebos
Out:
Sorin, Vengeful Bloodlord
Aminatou, the Fateshifter
Read the Runes
Forgotten Creation
Ghoulcaller Gisa
Thespian's Stage
Island
So the planeswalker subtheme is pretty much gone. Sorin wasn't bad, but his uses were a little conditional, and Aminatou had a similar impact, in that she was great in some situations, but they were too niche to justify inclusion anymore. Creation and Gisa were creatures I'd noticed I was just hanging on to and not casting when they came up in the last couple of games. Likewise with Runes, and Stage was too corner for this deck, which really just needs colour fixing as a priority in its lands.
I like the idea of upping the mana rocks slightly, and we've discussed Archive back and forth enough that now my copy isn't in use I ought to try it here. We all know I'm a little skeptical of it in a vacuum, but we'll see how it goes. Beacon is decent reusable spot reanimation for some of our more key pieces where needed, with versatility for artifacts too. Again, trialling - if it doesn't pull weight there's options to replace it with I guess. Darkness I want to try as a way of changing the momentum of the table. There's options to keep it in play with Soul Diviner and Hall of Heliod's Generosity, but even without them I think the idea would be to put the pinch on our opponents while we draw into answers and make a horde. Most of the creatures in the deck are mono black, as are all of our reanimation spells, so I can definitely play around it. It might do nothing, might do something, time will tell. Agent I like as a way to skew the bilateral nature of our reanimation spells like Patriarch's Bidding and Living Death, while still being tribe relevant and a reasonable control piece in it's own right. There's enchantments here to trigger it, but even just sacrificing it and reanimating it could get some value out of it.
I'll try to get some playtesting in over the next few days and see how all of this plays out!
In:
Grave Titan
The Locust God
Deliver Unto Evil
Sulfur Falls
Out:
Kazuul, Tyrant of the Cliffs
Inspiring Statuary
Mizzium Mortars
Island
So Titan and Locust are obviously chump blockers, and they should do quite well in that respect. Both have deterrents to attacking and can create a veritable horde for me. Locust even defies removal and loots for me, so I'm quite looking forward to trying it out. Deliver is one I've discussed with WizardMN around planeswalker recursion - there's not many options available for this, so possibly getting a couple back at the worst, or several back in a good scenario is worth looking at.
Statuary was just something I never wanted to cast. It goes down a similar route to Honor-worn Shaku, but just doesn't do as much in any way. Mortars was similar - reasonable critter destruction, but very much a reactive card to run, whereas with Titan I can block where needed and swing when it suits to, so is a far more proactive option for walker defense.
Brief weigh in without getting sucked into the discussion hugely....
I actually think that the above is sort of the key to this format, and experiencing it in the best way possible. Some complain about combo, some about battlecruiser jank, it's all subjective. The fact is that most cEDH/combo players would rather play against people with a similar approach, and the same holds true for casual jank - each one sees the other as the devil, without realising there's more than one way to skin a cat. There's been plenty of discussion over 'solving' the issue, but at the end of the day, if your end goal looks different to someone else's there's no way your standards will be confluent with another persons' who doesn't hold the same standards. This is where the quick pre-game chat comes in. It's not a firm solution, in that you won't reach an accord every time. But it is the only way you're going to avoid unpleasant surprises every time. I think expecting a ban list to be able to manage any possible disagreement is a fool's errand. It'll never work, there's just too much subjectivity to it.
I personally don't understand not wanting to have that discussion, but that's me. It's easy enough to pack yourself a couple of decks that encompass different levels of play and scale to the table.
Tornado by all accounts is pretty devastating. I don't run it myself purely because my engine is a little different (and I also don't have a copy), but I have it on good authority that it is pretty devastating.
I removed Blighted Woodland from my build personally. It's very, very slow. I ended up with Evolving Wilds and Terramorphic Expanse, which paid off massively. I'd add Prismatic Vista too if I could afford it. With the land recursion sub theme, these ones really do get a lot of work done (I vaguely remember seeing more of a land recursion theme in Roger's build than mine, I could be wrong though). I also run Thespian's Stage, and honestly, a lot of the time it's very much corner case tech - purely because the bigger burst lands like Cradle, Nykthos and Itlimoc are all legendary. I like corner cases anyway, so it stays.
The thing is, she's not quite the same as Azusa, Lost but Seeking in that you don't really want to drop her ASAP; you want to drop her when you can flip her right away, whether that's turn 3/4 or later - otherwise you might as well be running Civic Wayfinder. It's why a janky-ass land like Ghost Town or Drownyard Temple has some value in my list, because her transform might as well read 'landfall #7'. I definitely think Ancient Tomb would be a good add, but it's something you'd look to drop once you've got your engine in 3rd gear rather than first.
I can also vouch for Song of the Dryads. Being able to hit literally anything is fantastic for a great cost, especially with green typically having trouble with specific creature destruction. Oftentimes for me it just gives me enough space to get momentum going even if it does get removed, but a lot of the time its something people just...don't see coming.
Land recommendations from me:
How has Wave of Vitriol worked out for you? I've talked about how devastating it is for me, I'm interested to know how it has worked out here. Seems like it could be risky - it is for me too, but there's a good chance it could absolutely wreck face too.
Zombie Trailblazer is a budget Zombie Master lite. If you don't have a copy of the lord, run Trailblazer, sure. If you do have the lord, it's a hard pass.
As an aside, I took apart my Zedruu the Greathearted deck over the weekend, and there was some really, really excellent stuff in there. At least one or two pieces of it will make its way in here, I'll update the list later on this afternoon most likely.
I just picked Yawg up yesterday and put together an ad hoc list. Definitely closer to Kelzam’s in terms of build, purely because I don’t currently own a lot of mono black walkers. This is sort of the perfect deck for the latest Lili though, so I may introduce that element - for now though it’s very much a list centered around Yawg’s draw power. I’ll get a few play tests in and then probably bring my list online for critique.
Just a thought, not sure if it’s something we could go all in on, but there’s at least a couple of stax elements that do counters - Smokestack and Tangle Wire in particular. Has anyone tossed up running this sort of stuff?
It does seem to be one of those cards that you hold on to but doesn't quite fit anywhere well. I kinda like Mission Briefing to be honest. We don't have a lot of ways to recur spells effectively here, so that sort of helps with recasting the big reanimators. Shame it doesn't defy timing restrictions, but it's still decent. Funnily enough I just lost a game to decking out. It's always the turn before you win too. Had a stacked yard, Wayward Servant, Tombstone Stairwell and Eldrazi Monument in hand. Ah well.
I kind of like Coffin Queen for a proto-Havengul Lich for less. I'd be interested to hear how she plays out. Likewise with Agent, there's every reason to think it'd be a reasonable addition, and I have a couple of spots I could free up.
That's a decent endorsement. I think I'll probably skip her anyway, purely because my mana is very lean in this build. Plus she's still expensive
How does Gravespawn Sovereign stack up? Academically I like it for spot reanimation, but I worry about CMC and tapping down my board.
There's some interesting choices in your list - how have the following worked for you?
God Eternal Bontu
Coffin Queen
Liliana, Dreadhorde General
Agent of Erebos
I've tossed up adding Lili to a couple of builds, but she's weird one in that her ultimate is nasty and her static ability is good but I don't think I run enough attrition in any of my decks to justify casting her for 4BB. Agent I hadn't realised was a zombie to be honest. I had wondered how often you would get to trigger it, but that sort of answers that question, and I guess once or twice in a game is enough to make Patriarch's Bidding, Living Death and Zombie Apocalypse a little more unilateral. How well is Bontu working out? I've been hesitant to add it myself, purely because there's not a ton of stuff I really want to sac for draw (thinking on it, having Bontu and Lili out is kinda obscene draw value).
I have to admit I'm a little surprised to see Timetwister in the list, seems a strange add for such a graveyard oriented deck.