MTG Salvation

Look at it this way.

Blue is not supposed to have removal, not in the color, but it does have Bounce, draw, and counters. so blue is good on removal.

Red has so much burn it's stupid, and that all counts. Some recent additions like combust are fairly limited but rather strong in the situations they need to be. SO red is good on removal.

Green is not supposed to be a removal color by its nature, it tries to win on the ground. That being said it now has Plummet which is an extremely potent piece of specific removal.

White has a silly amount of removal as has been established.

Black has as much removal as it has ever had, not only including the gold cards you mentioned but doomblade, tendrils, corrupt, quag sickness (looks better every day), gatekeeper, vendetta, assassinate, deathmark, and more corner case ones.

There is no shortage of quality removal in the game right now.

Turn one Ritual -> Buried alive into 3 bloodghasts seems strongish. Granted it's easy to hate out, but it is a CA engine early on. I do feel like with vamps your best bet to win will be some sort of sacrifice combo with ghast, highborn, and sac outlets.

The deck probably has to play a controlish card advantage match, as it really cant outrace zoo, nor can it be faster than most combo. Hymn to tourach, Thoughtsieze, Sinkhole, Smallpox, cabal all seem great for the deck.

I feel like the Jace still maintains his look and overall spirit in anime form, but Chandra looks nothing like she was.

Chandra had a very cool steampunk sorta vibe going with her, and Japan knows how to do that, but this just looks like typical schlock anime girl. They changed fundamental things about her that they didn't with Jace, so it wasn't for lack of artistic ability. If you put that in front of me with out telling me what it was my first inclination would never have been that it was Chandra.

Additionally I kind of hate that not only do they make her cutesy in the new art, but they sexualize her more, as most anime tends to do. Just makes it feel cheapened to me. Free cards are free though, so I wouldn't toss them if i got them, but I still think the Chandra looks awful.

Should this deck consider running pack of negation? seems like if your planning on going off in one turn, would be a good counter.

I dislike how people keep complaining that there is not enough removal for Planeswalkers in the game. There is more removal for planeswalkers than almost any other card type. It's called dealing damage to your opponent.

Planeswalkers can be taken out (with card advantage), by players who attack with creatures instead of walling up behind walkers. often times walkers can be taken out by a burn spell. No other card in the game really save for creatures has that much removal inherent to the rules. Enchantments like bitterblossom, circles of protection, etc, are honestly way harder to take out and more detrimental to some builds than Jace, yet mono black and mono red decks still exist.

Part of the reason Jace seems so strong right now is because a lot of decks that are running him dont run many creatures, so in order to beat jace, they have to race him out and keep him out.

I'm not saying Jace isn't great. Of all the planeswalkers he's one of the few that can actually counteract it's own downside. He can come down and instantly give you +1 CA, which can protect your investment if he just gets nuked after, he can +2 to resist burn, or he can remove a creature to prevent them from killing him as well. Makes him pretty strong.

Now that I said that, realize that the same thing can be said about Chandra 1. She can burn out a creature for +1 CA, she can remove a creature to protect herself (same ability mind you), or she can +1 and protect herself from burn, even though she starts past burn level to begin with.

There is really no reason to ban him.

Based on the previewed art and what we know about these characters, what do we think will be in the boxes? Here is my theroy:

• Elspeth is bant colors, heavy white, Tez esper, leaning towards blue and black and white is more of elspeth's thing.
• Neither will have red cards, an argument that I think is strengthened by the fact that the burn deck is on it's way and in all likelihood is mono red.
• Nothing off the no reprint list, as WoTC would have disclosed that with the changes to it

So that being said here are my thoughts on some cards we can expect in the decks:

• Alara Tri Lands, as 3 color decks need mana fixing
• Soldier theme for Elspeth, including veteran armorsmith and sword smith. Captain of the watch would not be unexpeced.
• Thematically coat of arms fits Elspeth sigil back story rather well.
• I think we can easily expect to see a bunch of colored esper artifacts that reference other artifacts, such as protomater powder, Glaze fiend, and if were all lucky a new art Master of Etherium

So what do you guys think will be in the set?

I also live in Queens, pretty deep in, and believe me JHU is by far the best place to go. Good people, Steve who runs the show there is a great guy, and it's easily accessible. While there are some places in queens that supposedly do FNM, none of them have the space to accommodate enough people to make it worth while.

Plus JHU does not let non magic players play on Magic nights, so no YGO Retards gumming up the joint.

You can use Springleaf turn one off an ornithopter, you cant use mantle, just equip. I ran a single mantle as a 5th springleaf for a while, but then took it out as more often that not it was just a bit too slow.

So when playing a Pox build, do people generally like to be on the play or the draw game one?

It seems like playing would protect you from decks you need to hit with discard early on, like Charbelcher which can easily T1 you if you don't make them discard gas. At the same time draw provides you targets on your T1 for sinkhole and poxes, and the inherent card advantage of drawing.

Part of me believes that affinity wont really have the ability to shine without even some of the more non overpowered pieces, such as:

Cranial Plating
Thoughtcast
Frogmite

Would be sweet to see Thoughtcast come back to standard though. What I'm really hoping for this block is some sort of combo build, something standard has lacked for a while now. Polymorph is dandy and all, but i would liken it closer to control that combo, and i think affinity is a good place for combo to start.

Just starting to play Pox, threw this list together, looking for comments on how to make it better. There are a few 1 of's in the build, often they are less than a 1 of and more of a 5th or 6th of something else on the curve. Not sure how I feel about the number of lands in the deck, especially with 5 colorless producers, etc.

I can see them doing affinity, but probably more of a tribal affinity or something like the golems. I think it would be pretty bad assed to get something like affinity for goblins or something.

Was playing around with the idea of a beatdown deck that ran the new M11 lich. I came up with the following but not entirley sure what i could change to enhance the deck.



The basic idea is you can turn one ritual out either a stalker or, best case an indestructible lich with a counter on an indestructible land, and proceed to smash. There is a bunch of acceleration, some equipment to pair the lich with, disruption in thoughseize, and a single tendrils as you could probably find yourself in the position later on in the game where your storm count can make it lethal, even potentially early on. Fetch are merely for tombstalker acceleration.

So in the light of this list, here are some points i want to make about the logic behind the build.

No dark Confidant - I know hes pretty much the gold standard lately, but i just though it was too risky with so many 3+ CC cards in the deck, I may wind up changing my mind later on but right now it seems pretty risk in a eck that needs to run 4 tomb stalkers.

Lions eye diamond - Right now just because it teems with infernal tutor which is also a great card for the deck. Also allows me to run the single tendrils as a backup plan.

No Goyf - Once again I didn't want to have something counter to the initial game plan, which heavily revolves around tombstalker and emptying discards. Keeping the deck mono color also has its benefits, and since i need to run the indestructible land it feel like all the more reason.

So that being said, what can I do to this badboy to bring it to a place it needs to be to compete? Considered adding some removal like snuff out, also considered that i probably need more beaters, but not sure what is on the same level as the lich and tombstalker, as negator seems too weak against most of the field. I'm also aware how FOW basically tears the deck apart if well placed, but it feels to me that there is some real potential because of the strength of the lich and stalker on their own

Quote from EndlessEmergency

My friend works at a movie screening place, and he just told me that apparently a) Chandra, Jace and Tezzeret appear in the Sorcerer's Apprentice, and b) that promo versions of those three planeswalkers will be distributed at the theatre. I'll know more tonight when he gets off work, but he specifically said not Jace the Mind Sculpter or Chandra Ablaze.

I don't know what to make of it. This is the first I have heard of this. I would have thought that this would have been more advertised if it is real.

So if your pal works at a screening place, as opposed to a theater, the promotion may be more of a limited thing. Through my job I have been able to go to some advance screens in the past before, and a lot of times they have little goodie bags of junk, the celebs are there, etc. I remember i saw tale of desperux in a screening and for some reason walked out of the place with like 200 dollars in high end shaving accessories. go fig

I think the short answer to this thread is no, you cannot.