Wow, um, you really have a problem with me or something? I'm all for hearing your thoughts on why Gaddock isn't good, but I don't think it's necessary to bash me like that.
On the actual subject at hand...
I'm not saying Teeg is some amazing panacaea that is gonna save the magical world from 5-color or anything like that. All I'm saying is that he's gonna screw with a lot of decks plans. I mean it's all wonderful to point out that he can be PtE'ed or whatever, but I bet control doesn't really like having to kill him while Doran or whatever is beating them down. One thing he does is pull removal away from the actual threatening creatures.
As a Vengeant player, all I can say is, I could really care less about your teeg. It only mildy annoys me, and most of the time, I'm actually happy that you played it, so I can then Ko2 and accelerate to 5 on turn 4 (path to exile your teeg). You drop another one and I just chuck seige tokens at it, block your doran all day, and beat you in the air if I have to. My build has the following cards affected by teeg.
4 Ajani Vengeant
3 Banefire
4 Spectral Procession
Everything else in my deck can be played. You have neutralized 7 phase 3 cards and a phase 2 card. My deck is built on phase 2, and wins there most of the time.
I thought the same thing, but it turns out it doesn't really work exactly like that. From what I understand you can't redirect a Cruel Ultimatum at your opponent since he isn't a legal target for that spell. The copy on the other hand has no such limits. Since the copy resolves first you win on the spot if he is at 5 or less.
I've been trying to build this deck for some time now, and from what I see a lot of innovations have taken place since I last looked into the deck seriously. The absence of Kitchen Finks kind of surprises me, Murderous Redcap not so much. The thread doesn't seem to like Mind Stone that much, even though most MODO lists run it.
Can anyone explain the reasoning behind some of these innovations/standpoints?
I'm not really part of the thread, but I can give my opinions.
The lack of Kitchen Finks is really because you are already ahead in the red matchup (at least from what I've been playing). Spectral Procession works better to further that matchup and turns on Windbrisk Heights. I replaced Banefire for Murderous Redcap, even though I miss chucking those things with Seige Gang, and might put them in the side. My mind stones became Path to Exile because they both basically accomplish the same goal of turning on my knights and accelerating. Instead of drawing me cards, PtE removes the threat from the game for me instead.
Basically, I took the list that Flores wrote about last year, and made some changes to come up with my above list. Hopefully that explains my standpoint.
EDIT: I also cut the harbinger/forge-tender main for a 4th Reflecting Pool. They weren't doing enough and I needed the mana.
Not playing Path to Exile because of the drawback is like saying "I'm WW and don't play Swords to Plowshares because it gives them life."
What's better? Your opponent gaining seven, or you getting smashed by Verdant Force?
What's better? Your opponent getting a mountain, or you getting smashed by Demigod/Ashemoor Gouger/Figure of Destiny?
this is probably a dumb question but hows the matchup versus mistveil plains control aka two scoops?
Actually, with my Wispmares now in the board, I've pretty much have gone 50% against the deck. You Wispmare the mobilizations/endless horizons, and geddon with Ajani. They gain a ton of life, but if you're diligent, you CAN beat them down. It's hard for them to keep gaining life with Beacon of Immortality when you geddon them a few times. You just go one to 8 on ajani, geddon, and build back up repeatedly. They have a hard time recouping because you usually have at least something in play, and got rid of the problem enchantments.
The games I lost were usually do to me forgetting that Mobilization still works when making only one token a turn.
I'm probably going to cut the Responses and Cavaliers from the side. I really like Voice of All, and it has a shown to give me a lot of use in a lot of matches (namely, the burn style decks and the mirror. Also good in Kithkin). Responses I'm never siding in, and Stillmoon Cavalier never actually gets sided in even though I like them, I just don't know what to cut.
Drawing just one strip mine/black vise was often enough for them to stop the previous policy of restrictions in T2 and moving over to straight bannings.
While decent in principle, it could get rather stupid.
Wow, this stuff is pretty nifty. Huge fan of the Survivals.
Regardless, the only thing I have "pimped" is I have FNM foil UGMadness. Pretty much everything in the deck is fnm foil, and the lands are Arena. I feel so less awesome. Maybe I can get ahold of a scanner in the near future to put it down.
You forgot Madness, and to a lesser extent, MBC. Saying they "Sucked" is hardly fair, seeing as Madness probably saw more top8 time than Tog in the end. (obviously in extended and legacy, Tog was still king for a long time, though Thresh still sees tier 1 play)
Yeah man, like they said, they should be cutting down the multicolored soon. Shards was meant to play nice with Shadowmoor. (and Shadowmoor with tribal, etc)
Also, I think saying "Don't even tell me RDW is monocolored" is wrong, when you listed Sligh as a monocolored deck. Why isn't it right? Kithkin is also monocolored, and we get monocolored decks all the time. Sonic Boom had it's moment in the sun, MBC was strong pre-rotation, and 2 color decks are still the bread and butter of most formats.
Anywho, be happy, listing all those old formats made me remember how awesome Magic is, in that it changes all the time, but should you ever get in a bad spot, things are going to change soon anyways, etc.
First things first, MBC and UG madness didn't get decent until after Invasion left. MBC couldn't beat tog consistently, and UG madness wasn't strong enough with FoF Tog around. Those decks really came into fruition when Onslaught came around.
Because the deck works on a "multi-colored" card. That deck really isn't that good when you take Demigod out of it, a card not designed for red in mind. A card designed for RB, hence the reanimation part of it. Also, Flame Javelin is not "really" a red card, yet it's better with red obv. I mean, I've seen Flame Javelin in mono-white kithkin without a way to produce red. That's just retarded.
I didn't hear about that interview. That's sexy. Something to look forward too and hopefully the mana in Shards (that common painless city of brass is really ticking me off. Do they really think turn 1 vivid, turn 2 that card, turn 3 reflecting pool to firespout for GRU is normal? You threw blue in for good measure dangit.) doesn't outweigh the theme of the next block.
It's not that I "want" mono-colored. I do, but at the same time I'll play whatever is strongest pretty much. I just want the mana aspect of deck design to be challenging again. The deck I've been shipped for the past few weeks is a great example of the "problem" I'm seeing. The deck, consistently, drops Woolly Thoctar on turn 3 (if it draws it). Even if it doesn't draw it, it has WRG pretty much 85% of the time (didn't actually calculate, but it's very common) on turn 3. It can then usually drop a Wilt-Leaf Liege on turn 4. This doesn't make sense to me that a 3 color deck can be this consistent.
And just look at Zoo in extended. That deck, always has it's mana correct. The deck "can" (read: can but doesn't) go: Turn 1: Wild Nactyl, Turn 2 Bob, swing for 3 with Nactyl, Turn 3: Play a Doran. I know it doesn't play Doran, but that doesn't change the fact that it can play whatever the hell it wants with no penalty other than loss of life, which it then regains with Lightning Helixes and Jittes. This doesn't seem right.
Mono colored decks are still viable (the previously mentioned Kithkin), but taking the best of two or more colors and using them for one purpose is just more competitive. The way Wizards makes the cards, most decks do one or two things well, why not combine colors (especially with all the non-basic land's multi mana creation we have now) to do those things even better?
Because color discipline is fading.
Let's think about it, during Tempest/Saga, you had Painlands, City of Brass, and bad "depletion" lands to make multi-color work (not even enemy, you got thran quarry as well, but that wasn't really used). So, if I want to play RB, I have... Sulfurous Springs and the BR Depletion land from Tempest (forgive me for forgetting the name of that land). If I REALLY wanted consistency I could chuck some City of Brass in there. But I still had to do the majority of my mana as basics.
Now, if I want to build Black/Red, I get Auntie's Hovel, Graven Cairns, and Sulfurous Springs. And that doesn't even include possible vivids, reflecting pools, and those Shards lands that produce three types.
I'm merely complaining that mana is too easy these days and they need to either:
a.) stop printing such good mana, or
b.) bring stuff like Ghost Quarter/Rishadan Port/Wasteland back.
I don't expect it happening, just wanted to state my personal belief on this. This ain't Yu-Gi-Oh! or WoW, you shouldn't be able to play every spell you open in a booster.
Apparently, I'm alone in this thought process.
EDIT: Reflecting Pool was around, but wasn't needed usually. Sorry.
Back when I was still living with the rents I would bust about a case and a half each set. That's 9-10 boxes. This gave me lots of stuff to trade off, and I usually ended up with at least a set, usually 3/4 to 1/2 a playset for the set.
The downside is that it's costly. The upside is that you get tons of trade stock to trade to casual players. Now that I have to pay my own bills, I don't really do it anymore, but it's not a bad way of doing things.
I guess Kithkin is technically mono-colored, even though you gain a lot and lose a little for adding red/black.
The point I'm making is that there were 5 mono-colored strategies way back when I was getting serious, and they were all pretty viable unless the meta shifted on ya. (If you thought Sligh and Draw-Go were the decks to beat, play Stupid Green with an appropriate sideboard plan. Thinking it's Hatred and Sligh? Play WW. etc.)
Currently I see two decks that are good that are "single color". Those being RDW and Kithkin. Where's the Stompy deck? How about a non-linear WW build?
As an aside, I'd like to say that I'm not upset with magic. Far from it. You may have noticed up top that the standard formats were basically block decks facing off, now it's not as much the case (stares at Faeries and Kithkin). But at the same time, when is Wizards going to get off the "MULTICOLOR IS FUN!" mentality they have going? When I started it was basically like this:
Easiest way to build a deck: Mono-Colored
Moderately Easy: Allied Color Pairs
Hard: Enemy Color Pairs
Harder: Three color decks
WTF Hard: Five color
The other problem lies in the fact that you should be forced to take your colors weakness and figure out how to deal with it.
This multicolor stuff is basically making deckbuilders lazier as their mana bases require little thought. Also, it ruins a lot of the fun of new sets as it seems that every new set there's a new land that produces 12 colors of mana or something like it.
I guess I can go hide with my Carnophages, Jackal Pups, and Wall of Blossoms and reminisce of old times.
I remember back when I was first really getting into tournament magic, there was lots of decks that were viable but people insisted they had "less choice". I'm talking of Mirage/Tempest t2. Here's a general rundown of what was good during this time.
ProsBloom
Sligh/Deadguy Red (Deadguy Red changed a lot of what people think of as "sligh")
Suicide Black (It was meh, but you had Hatred. You didn't get stupid Flesh Reaver tricks, but you worked. Plus you had Duress)
White Weenie
CMU Blue/Buehler Blue (Also known as "Draw-Go")
Stupid Green
I feel that's enough for the point I'm trying to get to. Notice anything about that list of decks I just listed? 5 of the six are mono-color, and the sixth is 5 color.
Now, let's rotate mirage and add saga to the mix and you get...
COMBO! (Add two cards together, win target game!)
Basically, you won on turn 2-3 about 70% of the time. Tempest's Speed + Saga's ability to combo with any set for wins was a nightmare.
Let's rotate out Tempest, bringing in Mercadian Masques.
Replenish
Ankh Go
Counter Rebels
Skies
Trinity Green/Angry Hermit/Son of Hermit
Those were basically your decks. You had two combo decks (one not nearly as good as the other) that looked like control decks, a counterspell creature fish like deck, a true fish deck, and a mana denial strategy that actually didn't suck.
Now, let's rotate Saga and we get IPA:
Fires
Red Zone (Kibler's stupid Rith deck)
Terminator
Go-Mar/No-Mar
TurboBlit
Every deck is pretty much red based except Go-Mar, which was awesome. Now let's get Masques block out and bring in some OTJ:
Psychatog
Seriously. All other options pretty much sucked. FoF + Tog was nuts. Bringing in OLS:
Psychatog
Mono-White Control Tron/UW Control Tron
Goblin Bidding
UG Madness
So aggro gets good again. Yay. Rotate OTJ for MD5:
Affinity
Goblin Bidding
This is probably the "old school" for the majority of people reading this. You know this. Next up is Kamigawa
Affnity
Mono-U Shackles
More "old school". Next is Ravnica.
Magnivore
Heartbeat
Ghost Dad/Ghost Husk/Orzhov Aggro
Too many to mention, most of them are three colored or more.
Here's where the problem lays. Next is TS:
Lots of multi-colored shenanigans.
Then Lorwyn:
Faeries
Elves
Cryptic Command decks.
RDW
Now, you should know what the current t2 decks are.
Here's my problem. What happened to mono-color? It seems ever since Invasion the idea of playing only one color is just silly. I mean, I'm willing to say the mana is better NOW than it was during Ravnica. You don't get all those basic land types, but the drawbacks are spread over different types of fixing that the drawbacks are neglible. It seems these days that the status quo is two color, add more if you want. I find this very unsettling, and I want to play with lots of basics again.
And please, don't tell me RDW is an example of mono-color. The hybrid mechanic is intended for multicolored decks, not mono-colored. Even though Demigod is played in monored, it can be played just as easily in BR or B.
As much as I love Bad White Weenie decks (not an insult, I just refer to all creature strategies as bad. Yes... even Faeries. "Bad" habit I have from playing so long.), I can't get myself behind the deck with Lark in the format. However, Light from Within did intrigue me and here's what I came up with...
As a Vengeant player, all I can say is, I could really care less about your teeg. It only mildy annoys me, and most of the time, I'm actually happy that you played it, so I can then Ko2 and accelerate to 5 on turn 4 (path to exile your teeg). You drop another one and I just chuck seige tokens at it, block your doran all day, and beat you in the air if I have to. My build has the following cards affected by teeg.
4 Ajani Vengeant
3 Banefire
4 Spectral Procession
Everything else in my deck can be played. You have neutralized 7 phase 3 cards and a phase 2 card. My deck is built on phase 2, and wins there most of the time.
Teeg is solid, but not maindeckable.
It's a rain of tears with legs, and comes back with Rev.
I'm not really part of the thread, but I can give my opinions.
The lack of Kitchen Finks is really because you are already ahead in the red matchup (at least from what I've been playing). Spectral Procession works better to further that matchup and turns on Windbrisk Heights. I replaced Banefire for Murderous Redcap, even though I miss chucking those things with Seige Gang, and might put them in the side. My mind stones became Path to Exile because they both basically accomplish the same goal of turning on my knights and accelerating. Instead of drawing me cards, PtE removes the threat from the game for me instead.
Basically, I took the list that Flores wrote about last year, and made some changes to come up with my above list. Hopefully that explains my standpoint.
EDIT: I also cut the harbinger/forge-tender main for a 4th Reflecting Pool. They weren't doing enough and I needed the mana.
What's better? Your opponent gaining seven, or you getting smashed by Verdant Force?
What's better? Your opponent getting a mountain, or you getting smashed by Demigod/Ashemoor Gouger/Figure of Destiny?
Actually, with my Wispmares now in the board, I've pretty much have gone 50% against the deck. You Wispmare the mobilizations/endless horizons, and geddon with Ajani. They gain a ton of life, but if you're diligent, you CAN beat them down. It's hard for them to keep gaining life with Beacon of Immortality when you geddon them a few times. You just go one to 8 on ajani, geddon, and build back up repeatedly. They have a hard time recouping because you usually have at least something in play, and got rid of the problem enchantments.
The games I lost were usually do to me forgetting that Mobilization still works when making only one token a turn.
Protecting the Ajani is key in this matchup.
3 Mountain
4 Reflecting Pool
4 Windbrisk Heights
4 Rugged Prairie
4 Battlefield Forge
3 Reveilark
4 Ranger of Eos
4 Knight of White Orchid
3 Siege-Gang Commander
4 Mogg Fanatic
4 Figure of Destiny
4 Spectral Procession
3 Banefire
4 Path to Exile
4 Voice of All
4 Stillmoon Cavalier
3 Wrath of God
4 Guttural Response
I'm probably going to cut the Responses and Cavaliers from the side. I really like Voice of All, and it has a shown to give me a lot of use in a lot of matches (namely, the burn style decks and the mirror. Also good in Kithkin). Responses I'm never siding in, and Stillmoon Cavalier never actually gets sided in even though I like them, I just don't know what to cut.
Seriously, those Voice of Alls are just nuts.
Drawing just one strip mine/black vise was often enough for them to stop the previous policy of restrictions in T2 and moving over to straight bannings.
While decent in principle, it could get rather stupid.
Regardless, the only thing I have "pimped" is I have FNM foil UGMadness. Pretty much everything in the deck is fnm foil, and the lands are Arena. I feel so less awesome. Maybe I can get ahold of a scanner in the near future to put it down.
First things first, MBC and UG madness didn't get decent until after Invasion left. MBC couldn't beat tog consistently, and UG madness wasn't strong enough with FoF Tog around. Those decks really came into fruition when Onslaught came around.
Because the deck works on a "multi-colored" card. That deck really isn't that good when you take Demigod out of it, a card not designed for red in mind. A card designed for RB, hence the reanimation part of it. Also, Flame Javelin is not "really" a red card, yet it's better with red obv. I mean, I've seen Flame Javelin in mono-white kithkin without a way to produce red. That's just retarded.
I didn't hear about that interview. That's sexy. Something to look forward too and hopefully the mana in Shards (that common painless city of brass is really ticking me off. Do they really think turn 1 vivid, turn 2 that card, turn 3 reflecting pool to firespout for GRU is normal? You threw blue in for good measure dangit.) doesn't outweigh the theme of the next block.
It's not that I "want" mono-colored. I do, but at the same time I'll play whatever is strongest pretty much. I just want the mana aspect of deck design to be challenging again. The deck I've been shipped for the past few weeks is a great example of the "problem" I'm seeing. The deck, consistently, drops Woolly Thoctar on turn 3 (if it draws it). Even if it doesn't draw it, it has WRG pretty much 85% of the time (didn't actually calculate, but it's very common) on turn 3. It can then usually drop a Wilt-Leaf Liege on turn 4. This doesn't make sense to me that a 3 color deck can be this consistent.
And just look at Zoo in extended. That deck, always has it's mana correct. The deck "can" (read: can but doesn't) go: Turn 1: Wild Nactyl, Turn 2 Bob, swing for 3 with Nactyl, Turn 3: Play a Doran. I know it doesn't play Doran, but that doesn't change the fact that it can play whatever the hell it wants with no penalty other than loss of life, which it then regains with Lightning Helixes and Jittes. This doesn't seem right.
Either way, I'm pretty sure in the course of one day I've beaten this topic to death :-p
Because color discipline is fading.
Let's think about it, during Tempest/Saga, you had Painlands, City of Brass, and bad "depletion" lands to make multi-color work (not even enemy, you got thran quarry as well, but that wasn't really used). So, if I want to play RB, I have... Sulfurous Springs and the BR Depletion land from Tempest (forgive me for forgetting the name of that land). If I REALLY wanted consistency I could chuck some City of Brass in there. But I still had to do the majority of my mana as basics.
Now, if I want to build Black/Red, I get Auntie's Hovel, Graven Cairns, and Sulfurous Springs. And that doesn't even include possible vivids, reflecting pools, and those Shards lands that produce three types.
I'm merely complaining that mana is too easy these days and they need to either:
a.) stop printing such good mana, or
b.) bring stuff like Ghost Quarter/Rishadan Port/Wasteland back.
I don't expect it happening, just wanted to state my personal belief on this. This ain't Yu-Gi-Oh! or WoW, you shouldn't be able to play every spell you open in a booster.
Apparently, I'm alone in this thought process.
EDIT: Reflecting Pool was around, but wasn't needed usually. Sorry.
Back when I was still living with the rents I would bust about a case and a half each set. That's 9-10 boxes. This gave me lots of stuff to trade off, and I usually ended up with at least a set, usually 3/4 to 1/2 a playset for the set.
The downside is that it's costly. The upside is that you get tons of trade stock to trade to casual players. Now that I have to pay my own bills, I don't really do it anymore, but it's not a bad way of doing things.
The point I'm making is that there were 5 mono-colored strategies way back when I was getting serious, and they were all pretty viable unless the meta shifted on ya. (If you thought Sligh and Draw-Go were the decks to beat, play Stupid Green with an appropriate sideboard plan. Thinking it's Hatred and Sligh? Play WW. etc.)
Currently I see two decks that are good that are "single color". Those being RDW and Kithkin. Where's the Stompy deck? How about a non-linear WW build?
As an aside, I'd like to say that I'm not upset with magic. Far from it. You may have noticed up top that the standard formats were basically block decks facing off, now it's not as much the case (stares at Faeries and Kithkin). But at the same time, when is Wizards going to get off the "MULTICOLOR IS FUN!" mentality they have going? When I started it was basically like this:
Easiest way to build a deck: Mono-Colored
Moderately Easy: Allied Color Pairs
Hard: Enemy Color Pairs
Harder: Three color decks
WTF Hard: Five color
The other problem lies in the fact that you should be forced to take your colors weakness and figure out how to deal with it.
This multicolor stuff is basically making deckbuilders lazier as their mana bases require little thought. Also, it ruins a lot of the fun of new sets as it seems that every new set there's a new land that produces 12 colors of mana or something like it.
I guess I can go hide with my Carnophages, Jackal Pups, and Wall of Blossoms and reminisce of old times.
ProsBloom
Sligh/Deadguy Red (Deadguy Red changed a lot of what people think of as "sligh")
Suicide Black (It was meh, but you had Hatred. You didn't get stupid Flesh Reaver tricks, but you worked. Plus you had Duress)
White Weenie
CMU Blue/Buehler Blue (Also known as "Draw-Go")
Stupid Green
I feel that's enough for the point I'm trying to get to. Notice anything about that list of decks I just listed? 5 of the six are mono-color, and the sixth is 5 color.
Now, let's rotate mirage and add saga to the mix and you get...
COMBO! (Add two cards together, win target game!)
Basically, you won on turn 2-3 about 70% of the time. Tempest's Speed + Saga's ability to combo with any set for wins was a nightmare.
Let's rotate out Tempest, bringing in Mercadian Masques.
Replenish
Ankh Go
Counter Rebels
Skies
Trinity Green/Angry Hermit/Son of Hermit
Those were basically your decks. You had two combo decks (one not nearly as good as the other) that looked like control decks, a counterspell creature fish like deck, a true fish deck, and a mana denial strategy that actually didn't suck.
Now, let's rotate Saga and we get IPA:
Fires
Red Zone (Kibler's stupid Rith deck)
Terminator
Go-Mar/No-Mar
TurboBlit
Every deck is pretty much red based except Go-Mar, which was awesome. Now let's get Masques block out and bring in some OTJ:
Psychatog
Seriously. All other options pretty much sucked. FoF + Tog was nuts. Bringing in OLS:
Psychatog
Mono-White Control Tron/UW Control Tron
Goblin Bidding
UG Madness
So aggro gets good again. Yay. Rotate OTJ for MD5:
Affinity
Goblin Bidding
This is probably the "old school" for the majority of people reading this. You know this. Next up is Kamigawa
Affnity
Mono-U Shackles
More "old school". Next is Ravnica.
Magnivore
Heartbeat
Ghost Dad/Ghost Husk/Orzhov Aggro
Too many to mention, most of them are three colored or more.
Here's where the problem lays. Next is TS:
Lots of multi-colored shenanigans.
Then Lorwyn:
Faeries
Elves
Cryptic Command decks.
RDW
Now, you should know what the current t2 decks are.
Here's my problem. What happened to mono-color? It seems ever since Invasion the idea of playing only one color is just silly. I mean, I'm willing to say the mana is better NOW than it was during Ravnica. You don't get all those basic land types, but the drawbacks are spread over different types of fixing that the drawbacks are neglible. It seems these days that the status quo is two color, add more if you want. I find this very unsettling, and I want to play with lots of basics again.
And please, don't tell me RDW is an example of mono-color. The hybrid mechanic is intended for multicolored decks, not mono-colored. Even though Demigod is played in monored, it can be played just as easily in BR or B.
Anyways, I'm out for now.
4 Figure of Destiny
4 Goldmeadow Stalwart
4 Wizened Cenn
4 Knight of Meadowgrain
4 Wilt-Leaf Cavaliers
4 Hearthfire Hobgoblin
4 Oversoul of Dusk
3 Endless Horizons
3 Light from Within
3 Oblivion Ring
23 Plains
EDIT: Nice deck name btw.