I know how good the ability is, you are either looking at a Garruk, who gains loyalty when he puts a token on the battlefield. The problem simply is that you will have to remove 3-4 cards that are way better than the Chose from your deck. in combination with a few shuffle effects, you are even increasing the likelihood of drawing Nissa's Chosen in retaliation to drawing your walker.
Good point. The token errata could be better for this reason. I'll try a couple of drafts out with it as a token producer, and see which my group likes. I just like having a reusable shuffle option.
Pros of card form chosen: less hurt by bounce, shuffle effect; can help fill up your deck with lower curved creatures if your aggro; they go on the bottom of your library if killed, to be searched up again
Pros of tokens: less 2 mana dorks in your deck if your big green; can make more than 4 at a time.
Either way, Nissa is no Garruk. They really need to make a new green planeswalker... something with a beast within ability =O. She is playable in the cube, and can overwhelm opponents at times, but she is not as flashy as the other planeswalkers.
i'm not sure exactly what you mean by this but it doesn't sound like it's anywhere near balancing contract because it doesn't do anything during the actual game.
Sorry if my wording was poor. The idea is that when you play contract, you always lose a card from your deck. It's not a balance per say, but it ups the cost of playing the card to a level that my cube group is content with.
Chaos orb in my cube is targeted permanent removal. Very strong, and often first picked.
Contract From Below - Is so overpowered, that we up'd the errata to, you draw 8, and then an opponent gets the next card for the rest of the tourney. No, if you lose, he/she just gets is.
Nissa Revane - Comes with a playset of chosen. The reason I use a playset, is Nissa's ability is also suppose to thin your deck, and let you shuffle, two parts that are really crucial for her being good (especially with stuff like Mirri's Guile, top, or sylvan library, etc).
Rare B' Gone - Also counts mythic rares
Booster Tutor - Pack from the cube.
And we run with a ONE free mulligan policy, after that, you have to go down to 6, etc. Ultimately, just want to make the games more fun.
(no errata on super secret tech... makes it more gambly, and really fun in multiplayer to effect everyone!)
And lastly, thinking about making phyrexian crusader wither.
So, in order to show these errata I have just printed off the errata on clear plastic sheets, and inserted them into the cards. Its thin enough that it doesn't make your cards look funny in a deck.
Nim Deathmantle looks even better now that I read that last post. Someone try it out against some decks and post the results. Seems it is made for MB. Recursion with creatures that do stuff coming into the battlefield is very dangerous.
I would try out the deathmantle as a 1 of. The reason being that I wouldn't want to have any potential conflicts with my Vats. I see it as another Vat, and would just want 3 Vats and 1 Deathmantle. The differences are subtle enough that you can take advantage of either. However, because the mantle requires 4 mana it may be harder to work into our curves as easily. Seems like a small point, but it makes for a less clunky deck.
Furthermore, think about hands in which you would have deathmantle, and on what turn you would want to play it on? What spell orders does it fit into, and how often do we want to cast it on turn 2, and have an affect on turn 4? This may be too cute, as the Vat allows us to play with the opponents graveyards as well, and we are not just relying on our own to fuel our recursion.
Next, how well does it actually intersect with our game plan of removing their creatures and Vating them for CA? I know we set up our deck so all of our own creatures are fantastic Vat targets, and they are actually more beneficial for us coming into play every turn rather than recurring only when they die.
Nevertheless, the Mantle gives us powerful abilities in terms of fear and +2+2, and can also play into our recursion plans when we have the creatures on the board with open mana to support it. The largest advantage of the Vat is that we don't need the mana right away to get that creature imprinted, while with the mantle we have to keep mana up. Again, this makes our decks a bit clunkier, and the ultimate question is it worth running the Mantle for something we already get through our Vats?
I think I just answered my own question, the answer is likely no. Go with Vats, and potentially grim discoveries.
Mind sludge MD is really a metagame call. If your on MOTO, you tend to play against a lot more budget, drop everything fast decks. It can be a bit hard getting value with it then. Its a great SB card, and in the correct matchups its a pure house. The question then becomes, is it a better SB card then memoricide? That is a really tough call, as against the right decks memoricide is phenomenal, and usually those are the decks you are bringing the sludge in for anyways (and memoricide gets of at 4).
I totally think that Mind Sludge is a fine MD card, as long as you don't fight round after round of fast decks. If everyone is playing lots of blue and ramp (which they seem to be these days) put it in! Ultimately, each deck will be slightly different based on the experiences of the handler, and who they play against consistently. I am in a very large city, and play against a wide variety of decks, so I go for more resilience against aggro strategies. This is because mimic vat and all my removal tends to seal up the control match-ups anyways, and I want the faster curve to help against the faster decks.
And yes, hexmages rock in the current game, as almost every deck has some form of counters, and if not, first strike will often become relevant. Not the best board presence card against RDW, but a great out of the hand and sac answer.
And response to someone who pointed out I don't have enough answers for my own percy: I know! I may end up running more masticores and hexmages and dropping percy altogether. I find I can find a way after combat, though, with my various -x/-x cards. Its a risk I am taking, for sure, and want to see how it goes. I am being greedy, but it tends to soak up a removal spell for my titan.
Grave Titan over Wurmcoil engine: plays better with vat.
Molten-tail masticore: I think he is a really nice fit in the curve, and helps turn those early, non-vatted dudes in the yard into some serious removal. At 7 mana, becomes a real ass kicking with vat out.
Sb: Consume and bombs for aggro, duress for control, memoricide for valakut/ramp.dec; and more hexmages, cause they are awesome.
4 Tectonic Edges: Don't really see why people wouldn't run 4. So many non-basic lands that we want to do away with. And with the strong showing of ramp decks, I think being able to keep them off 6 is pretty good.
Only 2 Percy: Because sometimes it can get awkward removing them to win =P. But if you stick one on a vat its a quick game.
Drafted this, just wondering what people think I should cut to make the deck. Mono blue much? the rest was junk, btw. I ended up getting Traumatize first pick and went all in on the mill package, but didn't see very many in the end. 2x Trauma is silly, though.
1 AEther Adept
1 Air Servant
1 Armored Cancrix
3 Azure Drake
1 Diminish
2 Foresee
3 Ice Cage
1 Jace's Ingenuity
4 Mana Leak
1 Merfolk Spy
1 Mind Control
1 Phantom Beast
4 Tome Scour
2 Traumatize
4 Unsummon
1 Brittle Effigy
1 Whispersilk Cloak
Good point. The token errata could be better for this reason. I'll try a couple of drafts out with it as a token producer, and see which my group likes. I just like having a reusable shuffle option.
Pros of card form chosen: less hurt by bounce, shuffle effect; can help fill up your deck with lower curved creatures if your aggro; they go on the bottom of your library if killed, to be searched up again
Pros of tokens: less 2 mana dorks in your deck if your big green; can make more than 4 at a time.
Either way, Nissa is no Garruk. They really need to make a new green planeswalker... something with a beast within ability =O. She is playable in the cube, and can overwhelm opponents at times, but she is not as flashy as the other planeswalkers.
Sorry if my wording was poor. The idea is that when you play contract, you always lose a card from your deck. It's not a balance per say, but it ups the cost of playing the card to a level that my cube group is content with.
Chaos orb in my cube is targeted permanent removal. Very strong, and often first picked.
Blacker lotus - removed from game after use
Chaos Orb - same as everyone else's
Contract From Below - Is so overpowered, that we up'd the errata to, you draw 8, and then an opponent gets the next card for the rest of the tourney. No, if you lose, he/she just gets is.
Nissa Revane - Comes with a playset of chosen. The reason I use a playset, is Nissa's ability is also suppose to thin your deck, and let you shuffle, two parts that are really crucial for her being good (especially with stuff like Mirri's Guile, top, or sylvan library, etc).
Rare B' Gone - Also counts mythic rares
Booster Tutor - Pack from the cube.
And we run with a ONE free mulligan policy, after that, you have to go down to 6, etc. Ultimately, just want to make the games more fun.
(no errata on super secret tech... makes it more gambly, and really fun in multiplayer to effect everyone!)
And lastly, thinking about making phyrexian crusader wither.
So, in order to show these errata I have just printed off the errata on clear plastic sheets, and inserted them into the cards. Its thin enough that it doesn't make your cards look funny in a deck.
I would try out the deathmantle as a 1 of. The reason being that I wouldn't want to have any potential conflicts with my Vats. I see it as another Vat, and would just want 3 Vats and 1 Deathmantle. The differences are subtle enough that you can take advantage of either. However, because the mantle requires 4 mana it may be harder to work into our curves as easily. Seems like a small point, but it makes for a less clunky deck.
Furthermore, think about hands in which you would have deathmantle, and on what turn you would want to play it on? What spell orders does it fit into, and how often do we want to cast it on turn 2, and have an affect on turn 4? This may be too cute, as the Vat allows us to play with the opponents graveyards as well, and we are not just relying on our own to fuel our recursion.
Next, how well does it actually intersect with our game plan of removing their creatures and Vating them for CA? I know we set up our deck so all of our own creatures are fantastic Vat targets, and they are actually more beneficial for us coming into play every turn rather than recurring only when they die.
Nevertheless, the Mantle gives us powerful abilities in terms of fear and +2+2, and can also play into our recursion plans when we have the creatures on the board with open mana to support it. The largest advantage of the Vat is that we don't need the mana right away to get that creature imprinted, while with the mantle we have to keep mana up. Again, this makes our decks a bit clunkier, and the ultimate question is it worth running the Mantle for something we already get through our Vats?
I think I just answered my own question, the answer is likely no. Go with Vats, and potentially grim discoveries.
I totally think that Mind Sludge is a fine MD card, as long as you don't fight round after round of fast decks. If everyone is playing lots of blue and ramp (which they seem to be these days) put it in! Ultimately, each deck will be slightly different based on the experiences of the handler, and who they play against consistently. I am in a very large city, and play against a wide variety of decks, so I go for more resilience against aggro strategies. This is because mimic vat and all my removal tends to seal up the control match-ups anyways, and I want the faster curve to help against the faster decks.
And yes, hexmages rock in the current game, as almost every deck has some form of counters, and if not, first strike will often become relevant. Not the best board presence card against RDW, but a great out of the hand and sac answer.
And response to someone who pointed out I don't have enough answers for my own percy: I know! I may end up running more masticores and hexmages and dropping percy altogether. I find I can find a way after combat, though, with my various -x/-x cards. Its a risk I am taking, for sure, and want to see how it goes. I am being greedy, but it tends to soak up a removal spell for my titan.
2x Abyssal Persecutor
4x Gatekeeper of Malakir
2x Grave Titan
2x Molten-tail Masticore
4x Liliana's Specter
3x Skinrender
2x Vampire Hexmage
4x Doom Blade
2x Grasp of Darkness
Sorcery (8)
4x Inquisition of Kozilek
4x Sign in Blood
Land (24)
2x Bojuka Bog
18x Swamp
4x Tectonic Edge
3x Consume the Meek
3x Duress
4x Memoricide
3x Ratchet Bomb
2x vampire hexmage
Grave Titan over Wurmcoil engine: plays better with vat.
Molten-tail masticore: I think he is a really nice fit in the curve, and helps turn those early, non-vatted dudes in the yard into some serious removal. At 7 mana, becomes a real ass kicking with vat out.
Sb: Consume and bombs for aggro, duress for control, memoricide for valakut/ramp.dec; and more hexmages, cause they are awesome.
4 Tectonic Edges: Don't really see why people wouldn't run 4. So many non-basic lands that we want to do away with. And with the strong showing of ramp decks, I think being able to keep them off 6 is pretty good.
Only 2 Percy: Because sometimes it can get awkward removing them to win =P. But if you stick one on a vat its a quick game.
1 AEther Adept
1 Air Servant
1 Armored Cancrix
3 Azure Drake
1 Diminish
2 Foresee
3 Ice Cage
1 Jace's Ingenuity
4 Mana Leak
1 Merfolk Spy
1 Mind Control
1 Phantom Beast
4 Tome Scour
2 Traumatize
4 Unsummon
1 Brittle Effigy
1 Whispersilk Cloak