So, while I like a lot about Shadows over Innistrad, Investigate is kind of interesting, and I love DFC's, Madness is cool as always. But I really don't know what to think of Delerium.
Seems like one of those mechanics that will be a huge pain in the butt to play with.
Just wondering what the consensus is out there.
I am no expert, I don't pretend to be, but can someone explain to me how Bring to Light/Scapechift is a viable archetype?
I get how the two cards work together, but the decklists I see have almost no actual win conditions.
Are your opponents running the more cutthroat tribes, like Humans, Elves, or Zombies?
Or are they playing Volvers and Apes?
A bit of both. We are an extremely casual playgroup and aren't out netdecking and playtesting, but the idea is to win after all. But the other decks can range from a tightly assembled Goblin Deck to a Sliver deck that is basically "Highlander Slivers" just to see what happens. And we usually play multiple decks per person in a mini-tournament to see which tribe comes out on top...kind of a Tribal World Cup.
If the former, I think you should go more in the direction of interfering with their plans via wraths. If that feels cheesy to you, I would recommend the mana ramping walls to slow down attacks. The best ones are Overgrown Battlement and Axebane Guardian. That leaves you very little wiggle room for flex spells, I understand, but they do a pretty good job of creating big mana for Mastery of the Unseen.
I can't remember if I mentioned this earlier in the thread, but this is my 4th attempt at this deck. While I didn't try Overgrown Battlement or Axepane, I DID have Vine Trellis. (Obviously not as good) The problem with that is that I lose Mana Acceleration because I can't tap them for Mana if I need them to block. So I sit there with a mana source staring at me that I can't really use.
Wraths can be problematic because the faster decks can often get back on their feet more easily than the Wurms can. Novablast Wurm is an exception because it sticks around and does 7 damage every turn since it clears the board before blockers can be declared.
Not meaning to PooPoo on any suggestions, which it often seems my responses are doing...but just giving additional thoughts and experiences.
Do you really want to play a 2 mana 2/2 vanilla, a 1WW 2/2 flying, lifelink, or a 3G 3/3? None of those sound even remotely good to me.
A good point...I might as well just add 4 cheap creatures as opposed to Lightform. Similar problem with the other Sorceries, especially since I may accidentally lose some of my utility spells or mana drops instead of a creature.
If you run manifest cards, you'll probably have to run some flicker effects to flip the wurms over.
But do I?
I would think I would have enough other Wurms to do the heavy lifting so the ones I manifest would just be early blockers and/or damage.
I would not expect to flip them over very often, if at all.
Which is why I thought Lightform might be a nice addition.
But in the end I really would only have room for a playset of ONE of the eligible Manifests.
Sorry about ressurecting this post from teh dead, but I just realized that Manifest might be the answer to the deck's problems.
What would people suggest?
I won't want any creatures for the Tribal concerns listed above. And W/G is still the mana base I want due to Novablast Wurm Formless Nurturing seems too costly; Lightform gives me flying and lifelink; Mastery of the Unseen is a frontrunner I would think; Soul Summons is nice and cheap, but is it too much "one and done"?; Wildcall looks like a front runner too due to my available mana.
Any thoughts on which I might include and what I might pull out?
To my understanding, leagues were stopped because of how/when cards entered your collection. When leagues were first created, the cards you received in them became part of your collection at the start of the league (sealed events worked the same way) they just couldn't be traded until that league (or event) ended. At some point in time, the change was made that the cards in sealed events would become part of your collection at the conclusion of that event. Because of this change, they couldn't get leagues to work in the manner that they had worked in the past.
Now I am wondering why this was an issue that needed a change?
The leagues required you to buy your own "product" and bring it to the game. You didn't lose any of the cards through the process, so why couldn't they be in your collection from the moment you opened them? I understand the block on trading, makes perfect sense to not be able to get rid of the cards while they were "active" in the league.
So why not let you use them more or less however you wanted?
Seems like a dumb change that derailed a fantastic format.
The last thing I saw was that they were planning on kicking them off in "Early 2015"...well...its the end of April, kind of the last month that could be considered "Early" in the year...
I loved them when I originally played MTGO, (I am almost willing to say it is the best format to take advantage of the MTGO interface/community) and will definitely be getting back into them once they launch...It will actually get me back into the game again...
Do you know if cards with the changeling ability are considered wurms for the purposes of tribal deck building? Also, do non-creature tribal cards count?
In regards to Changeling, technically, yes they count if this were a sanctioned FNM tournament or something. But I won't lie, we have informal house rules. Flavor plays a big part.
One of the first ones I built was a Rat Tribal deck that had 4 copies of Corrupt that did the real damage, so basically it was a Corrupt deck that happened to have 20 Rats. We all agreed it was not in the spirit of the Tribal theme.
So an old school Elfball deck fits the theme, an Elf deck that ramped you up to Lord of the Pit would be borderline, and some sort of Elf/Pestilence thing probably wouldn't.
It's a fine line to be sure...but just having the Wurms to meet the requirement and then relying on Fireballing them as the killing blow is "cheating"
Seems like one of those mechanics that will be a huge pain in the butt to play with.
Just wondering what the consensus is out there.
I missed how Valakut worked so I disregarded it as a win condition...
I am no expert, I don't pretend to be, but can someone explain to me how Bring to Light/Scapechift is a viable archetype?
I get how the two cards work together, but the decklists I see have almost no actual win conditions.
What am I missing?
What is up with this "Expeditions" product they are doing? Something about lands, but that might only be useable in limited?
Or something like that?
Was just wondering what the discussion was at the Magic Comic Con panel.
Obviously there were announcements, but I didn't see an article discussing them on Wizards.com.
Is there a cliff notes version?
A bit of both. We are an extremely casual playgroup and aren't out netdecking and playtesting, but the idea is to win after all. But the other decks can range from a tightly assembled Goblin Deck to a Sliver deck that is basically "Highlander Slivers" just to see what happens. And we usually play multiple decks per person in a mini-tournament to see which tribe comes out on top...kind of a Tribal World Cup.
I can't remember if I mentioned this earlier in the thread, but this is my 4th attempt at this deck. While I didn't try Overgrown Battlement or Axepane, I DID have Vine Trellis. (Obviously not as good) The problem with that is that I lose Mana Acceleration because I can't tap them for Mana if I need them to block. So I sit there with a mana source staring at me that I can't really use.
Wraths can be problematic because the faster decks can often get back on their feet more easily than the Wurms can. Novablast Wurm is an exception because it sticks around and does 7 damage every turn since it clears the board before blockers can be declared.
Not meaning to PooPoo on any suggestions, which it often seems my responses are doing...but just giving additional thoughts and experiences.
A good point...I might as well just add 4 cheap creatures as opposed to Lightform. Similar problem with the other Sorceries, especially since I may accidentally lose some of my utility spells or mana drops instead of a creature.
But Mastery of the Unseen is repeatable and might be the best option of them.
Hmm...
Still considering swapping out Drain the Well for Dawnglow Infusion
But do I?
I would think I would have enough other Wurms to do the heavy lifting so the ones I manifest would just be early blockers and/or damage.
I would not expect to flip them over very often, if at all.
Which is why I thought Lightform might be a nice addition.
But in the end I really would only have room for a playset of ONE of the eligible Manifests.
It looks like it is without question the best Deck bag on the market.
I think ultimately the question is are you willing to shell out $50 bucks for a Deck Bag?
What would people suggest?
I won't want any creatures for the Tribal concerns listed above. And W/G is still the mana base I want due to Novablast Wurm
Formless Nurturing seems too costly; Lightform gives me flying and lifelink; Mastery of the Unseen is a frontrunner I would think; Soul Summons is nice and cheap, but is it too much "one and done"?; Wildcall looks like a front runner too due to my available mana.
Any thoughts on which I might include and what I might pull out?
Now I am wondering why this was an issue that needed a change?
The leagues required you to buy your own "product" and bring it to the game. You didn't lose any of the cards through the process, so why couldn't they be in your collection from the moment you opened them? I understand the block on trading, makes perfect sense to not be able to get rid of the cards while they were "active" in the league.
So why not let you use them more or less however you wanted?
Seems like a dumb change that derailed a fantastic format.
It was, and in many ways continues to be, my favorite Magic format...though I miss Tournament Packs in my sealed deck building.
The last thing I saw was that they were planning on kicking them off in "Early 2015"...well...its the end of April, kind of the last month that could be considered "Early" in the year...
I loved them when I originally played MTGO, (I am almost willing to say it is the best format to take advantage of the MTGO interface/community) and will definitely be getting back into them once they launch...It will actually get me back into the game again...
I really like it, but apparently I suck at it and can't figure out why.
One of the first ones I built was a Rat Tribal deck that had 4 copies of Corrupt that did the real damage, so basically it was a Corrupt deck that happened to have 20 Rats. We all agreed it was not in the spirit of the Tribal theme.
So an old school Elfball deck fits the theme, an Elf deck that ramped you up to Lord of the Pit would be borderline, and some sort of Elf/Pestilence thing probably wouldn't.
It's a fine line to be sure...but just having the Wurms to meet the requirement and then relying on Fireballing them as the killing blow is "cheating"
We casual players can be so annoying sometimes...