While I love the new goblin token in SOM (it's my favourite goblin token since Unglued) I find it a little strange that they drastically changed the look of Mirran goblins since the original Mirrodin block. It's especially strange when you consider that none of the other races got such an artistic overhaul.
The original Mirran goblins have the generic appearance (making sense, since they were abducted from other worlds), while the new ones have the bobblehead thing going on.
The original's spikes appear to be firing from his torso, while the art for the elder indicates that he shoots the spikes from his back. The flavor text also implies that they're either the same person or that they're related in some capacity (probably more likely).
Maybe I'm just being nitpicky, but has creative given any reason as to why they changed the look of the goblins from Mirrodin 1.0?
My meta is mainly control, ramp variants, and various aggro decks (there's a lot of green and red). I generally don't have any problem with control and ramp matchups, and most of the time I fare well against various aggro strategies, but mono-black is a thorn in my side. This is the shell of the deck that keeps thrashing me:
It also ran some number of Duress, Liliana Vess, and various removal spells (which should really be blanks against me). I think I saw a Mind Sludge or two as well. In retrospect it looks like it's more on the mid-range end of the spectrum, but it still delivers a solid beating every time I play it.
Can anyone provide some sideboarding tips? Since my control matchup is very favourable anyway, I'm thinking of taking the Sign in Bloods out of my SB and replacing them with 2 more Smothers to help shore up the aggro matchups.
My current SB plan is:
-3 Doom Blade
-2 Negate
-1 Jace
+2 Smother
+2 Disfigure
+2 Grave Titan
Elixir Of Immortality
Consuming Vapors
Sorin Markov
Are the options I would recommend for lifegain.
Doesn't Vapors lose a fair bit of effectiveness (lifegain wise) against Boros? When their creatures are generally x/1s during your turn, you'd probably only get 2-3 life out of one Vapors. I suppose it's still a 2-for-1, but the lifegain seems really negligible.
I've found that a turn-1 Inquisition of Kozilek puts you in a very advantageous position, especially if you're on the play.
I guess the problem stems from multiple recurring Bloodghasts. The deck I have the most problems with also runs a lot of small efficient beaters like Nantuko Shade and Hexmage (it's more MBA than vamps), and I find it really hard to keep up with Bloodghasts AND his additional threats.
I assume the best plan is to stall until I can resolve a Grave Titan?
In the past couple of weeks, mono-black aggro has become really popular at my FNM, and every time I vs it I get dominated. The only time I seem to have a decent shot at winning this matchup is if they get a bad draw.
Is anyone else having trouble with this matchup? I'm running the permission variant, and I'd like to know if the tap-out variant fares any better against MBA.
Thanks, that's the clarification I was looking for. The judge was absent at that point, and I didn't want to make a big deal out of it (the informant is a friend so I let it slide, but not without giving him an earful).
The following happened in round 2 of last week's FNM:
After I track down my opponent and sit down with him, we idly chat while shuffling up. As we present our shuffled decks to each other for cutting, my opponent mentions that he's never played against me at FNM before, so he doesn't know what kind of deck I'm playing (he only knows that I'm using Jace 2). One of the FNM regulars sitting next to me leans over and tells him "UB permission control".
As soon as my opponent heard this, he knew exactly what kind of control build I was using (it was modeled after the California Champs 1st place deck). This arguably gave him an edge against me, since he knew what cards to play around while I was going in blind against him.
The informant claims that it wasn't coaching/outside assistance, because the information was given before any plays had been made. He likened it to people going around scouting for information between matches. Is he correct, or was he actually coaching?
The Tournament Rules document only vaguely covers cheating/spectating, and apparently has nothing about coaching.
Actually, I guess I should continue the thoughts from earlier. I guess the most likely character to die at the moment is Sarkhan, but not before he ends up pulling a heel/face turn. Besides that, Sorin might buy it too, but only as the removal of a major player sort of thing. He likely won't see it coming when it happens. Most of the younger characters, like Jace and Koth and Nissa are pretty safe I think. Chandra... is a more difficult thing, and of the white walkers, I think Gideon is the most likely to fall.
Hahahaha, thanks for bringing it back on topic!
I'm gonna have to agree with Stardust and say Nissa might bite the dust while fighting the Eldrazi. I guess you could liken her story arc to Boromir's; she does something selfish, realises how badly she messed up, and ultimately sacrifices herself in combat to help the others.
The death of a significant character isn't an uncommon occurrence in the Magic novels, and since Planeswalkers are now mortals it's entirely possible that one (or more) will die in the future.
Who do you think would be the first to go, and for what reasons?
I'm gonna go with Sarkhan Vol. After going mad and becoming a mindless slave to Bolas, I don't see there being much room for further development. Even if he has a change of heart and repents, I doubt that Bolas would let him jump ship so easily.
Since you are pretty much dead to a turn 1 Quest or turn 2 Luminarch Ascension I like the insurance.
Well, not quite. Quest doesn't do anything if you stop them playing creatures or kill them as they come, and Luminarch can be staved off with Tar Pits. I wouldn't say our chances are GOOD against a resolved Quest or Luminarch, but we definitely have outs.
Obviously this is a bit of a meta call. There are a LOT of elves at my FNM, and only a couple of decks with Quest/Luminarch.
Don't get me wrong, I wasn't criticising the judge nor his ruling on the situation. He's actually a good friend of mine, and generally we agree on rulings.
However, seeing as how the attack phase had ended before my opponent noticed his mistake, I believe the ruling was to my disadvantage. Had I known during combat that he was attacking Jace, things may have played out differently.
Thus I ask about the limits of "ruling by intent" and how it's generally handled.
The situation: I have a Jace, the Mind Sculptor in play with 3 loyalty counters, and my opponent has a single Frost Titan as his only creature. It's his turn, and he announces attacks.
The problem: My opponent announces attacks, taps his Frost Titan, and says to me "Swing at you". I declare no blocks and take the hit, marking it on my life counter. My opponent then begins his post-combat main phase, but when he notices that my Jace is still alive he says "Sorry, I meant to say I attacked Jace, not you"
An argument starts up. My opponent says he intended to swing at Jace, but due to being overtired he accidentally said out loud that he was swinging at me. We call the judge over, and he rules it in my opponents favour, saying his intent outweighs his actions.
The question: Is there such a thing as "intent over action"? The local judge has been known to be wrong from time to time. If there is such a thing, what are its limits? Was the judge allowed to let my opponent retroactively change the board state after the attack phase had ended?
But why not just say, "A spell with infect", if they don't intend to print any non-creature sources with infect?
Which was exactly my point.
Look at Horde of Notions, which I mentioned in the OP. It was clearly designed to work with elemental-type creatures and noncreature spells. I feel that they've gone the other way with HotP, since triggering it off of a hypothetical Infect burn spell could be too good.
If, and that's a big if considering that MaRo pretty much ruled it out when he mentioned that he only wanted infect on creatures, they decide to do direct infect-type damage, then it couldn't have infect as a keyword.
Is it possible to get a quote on this? Or was it from a random Twitter post?
That said, if they never intend to print noncreature Infect cards, what would be the point of the creature-only clause in HotP's ability? It just seems a little redundant.
At the very least, I'm expecting something along the lines of a high-costed fatty Legendary Creature that grants Infect to your damage sources.
For comparison:
Kuldotha Rebirth
Krark-Clan Engineers
The original Mirran goblins have the generic appearance (making sense, since they were abducted from other worlds), while the new ones have the bobblehead thing going on.
Also:
Spikeshot Goblin
Spikeshot Elder
The original's spikes appear to be firing from his torso, while the art for the elder indicates that he shoots the spikes from his back. The flavor text also implies that they're either the same person or that they're related in some capacity (probably more likely).
Maybe I'm just being nitpicky, but has creative given any reason as to why they changed the look of the goblins from Mirrodin 1.0?
3x Inquisition of Kozilek
4x Preordain
3x Doom Blade
2x Into the Roil
4x Mana Leak
2x Negate
4x Cancel
2x Mindbreak Trap
2x Consume the Meek
4x Jace's Ingenuity
4x Creeping Tar Pit
4x Darkslick Shore
2x Drowned Catacomb
4x Tectonic Edge
7x Island
4x Swamp
2x Grave Titan
2x Sign in Blood
2x Disfigure
2x Smother
4x Flashfreeze
3x Duress
My meta is mainly control, ramp variants, and various aggro decks (there's a lot of green and red). I generally don't have any problem with control and ramp matchups, and most of the time I fare well against various aggro strategies, but mono-black is a thorn in my side. This is the shell of the deck that keeps thrashing me:
4x Nantuko Shade
4x Vampire Hexmage
4x Gatekeeper of Malakir
2x Grave Titan
4x Sign in Blood
It also ran some number of Duress, Liliana Vess, and various removal spells (which should really be blanks against me). I think I saw a Mind Sludge or two as well. In retrospect it looks like it's more on the mid-range end of the spectrum, but it still delivers a solid beating every time I play it.
Can anyone provide some sideboarding tips? Since my control matchup is very favourable anyway, I'm thinking of taking the Sign in Bloods out of my SB and replacing them with 2 more Smothers to help shore up the aggro matchups.
My current SB plan is:
-3 Doom Blade
-2 Negate
-1 Jace
+2 Smother
+2 Disfigure
+2 Grave Titan
Doesn't Vapors lose a fair bit of effectiveness (lifegain wise) against Boros? When their creatures are generally x/1s during your turn, you'd probably only get 2-3 life out of one Vapors. I suppose it's still a 2-for-1, but the lifegain seems really negligible.
I've found that a turn-1 Inquisition of Kozilek puts you in a very advantageous position, especially if you're on the play.
I assume the best plan is to stall until I can resolve a Grave Titan?
Is anyone else having trouble with this matchup? I'm running the permission variant, and I'd like to know if the tap-out variant fares any better against MBA.
1: Lands aren't spells (Great Furnace) so no, you don't get to draw.
2: Yes, the ability still goes on the stack, and even if the source is removed it still resolves.
After I track down my opponent and sit down with him, we idly chat while shuffling up. As we present our shuffled decks to each other for cutting, my opponent mentions that he's never played against me at FNM before, so he doesn't know what kind of deck I'm playing (he only knows that I'm using Jace 2). One of the FNM regulars sitting next to me leans over and tells him "UB permission control".
As soon as my opponent heard this, he knew exactly what kind of control build I was using (it was modeled after the California Champs 1st place deck). This arguably gave him an edge against me, since he knew what cards to play around while I was going in blind against him.
The informant claims that it wasn't coaching/outside assistance, because the information was given before any plays had been made. He likened it to people going around scouting for information between matches. Is he correct, or was he actually coaching?
The Tournament Rules document only vaguely covers cheating/spectating, and apparently has nothing about coaching.
Hahahaha, thanks for bringing it back on topic!
I'm gonna have to agree with Stardust and say Nissa might bite the dust while fighting the Eldrazi. I guess you could liken her story arc to Boromir's; she does something selfish, realises how badly she messed up, and ultimately sacrifices herself in combat to help the others.
Who do you think would be the first to go, and for what reasons?
I'm gonna go with Sarkhan Vol. After going mad and becoming a mindless slave to Bolas, I don't see there being much room for further development. Even if he has a change of heart and repents, I doubt that Bolas would let him jump ship so easily.
Well, not quite. Quest doesn't do anything if you stop them playing creatures or kill them as they come, and Luminarch can be staved off with Tar Pits. I wouldn't say our chances are GOOD against a resolved Quest or Luminarch, but we definitely have outs.
Obviously this is a bit of a meta call. There are a LOT of elves at my FNM, and only a couple of decks with Quest/Luminarch.
However, seeing as how the attack phase had ended before my opponent noticed his mistake, I believe the ruling was to my disadvantage. Had I known during combat that he was attacking Jace, things may have played out differently.
Thus I ask about the limits of "ruling by intent" and how it's generally handled.
The problem: My opponent announces attacks, taps his Frost Titan, and says to me "Swing at you". I declare no blocks and take the hit, marking it on my life counter. My opponent then begins his post-combat main phase, but when he notices that my Jace is still alive he says "Sorry, I meant to say I attacked Jace, not you"
An argument starts up. My opponent says he intended to swing at Jace, but due to being overtired he accidentally said out loud that he was swinging at me. We call the judge over, and he rules it in my opponents favour, saying his intent outweighs his actions.
The question: Is there such a thing as "intent over action"? The local judge has been known to be wrong from time to time. If there is such a thing, what are its limits? Was the judge allowed to let my opponent retroactively change the board state after the attack phase had ended?
Which was exactly my point.
Look at Horde of Notions, which I mentioned in the OP. It was clearly designed to work with elemental-type creatures and noncreature spells. I feel that they've gone the other way with HotP, since triggering it off of a hypothetical Infect burn spell could be too good.
Is it possible to get a quote on this? Or was it from a random Twitter post?
That said, if they never intend to print noncreature Infect cards, what would be the point of the creature-only clause in HotP's ability? It just seems a little redundant.
At the very least, I'm expecting something along the lines of a high-costed fatty Legendary Creature that grants Infect to your damage sources.