Back for Lorwyn/Shadowmoor/Time Spiral standard, I ran a RW deck with Norin the Wary that included Pandemonium, Cloudstone Curio, Keldon Marauders, and other fun things. More recently, I built a Norin EDH deck.
And then last week I noticed a card I wasn't aware of: Impact Tremors. Boom. I put together a Modern deck and took it to Black Moon games last night. Here's the deck I ran: (Quick summary: Impact Tremors, Genesis Chamber + Norin and dash creatures.)
4 Impact Tremors
3 Genesis Chamber (I couldn't find a fourth in time!)
2 Outpost Siege
1 Purphoros
4 Norin the Wary
4 Glitterfang
4 Mardu Scout
4 Lightning Berserker
3 Zurgo Bellstriker
2 Hordeling Outburst
4 Screamreach Brawler
1 Goblin Heelcutter
24 Mountain
I played 4 rounds last night:
Round 1, I lost 0-2 to a WUBR deck. Elesh Norn kicked my butt game 1 and I sided into stuff that was too conservative for game 2. I didn't realize how potent I could be until the next round...
Round 2: Won 2-1 to my own Spiteclasm deck, piloted by my friend Matt F. He won game 1 handily, but I pulled off a turn 5 win to take game 2. First turn Norin followed up by either Impact Tremors or the Genesis Chamber is very strong! In game 3, Matt got hit by the mana screw, and I won within 10 turns.
Round 3: Won 2-1 against a Jund deck run by Nate, who was my other head in 2HG sealed last month. (We went 2-1 to take second place of 4 teams.) I lost game 1, but got to stack up my trigger cards (tremors, chamber, Outpost Siege, Purphoros) the next two games, which pulled the win off for me. Turns out that Outpost Siege is really strong against Goblin Rabblemaster: the goblins have to attack and two dying Myr can kill the master.
Round 4: Lost 1-2 against Merfolk. I won game 1 handily, but couldn't handle the onslaught in games 2 and 3. I should have mulliganed down to 5 for game 3, but I kept an okayish 6-card hand. I really needed to get the turn 2 Norin + support to make this one happen. Tough.
Summary: 2-2, not too bad for a deck I threw together the night before (with essentially no sideboard). Future plans: I heard today about the RW version, Soul Chamber, though I really want to keep the Impact Tremors and dash creatures. Perhaps I can fit the white in just enough to fit 4 Soul Warden and 4 Soul's Attendant. Also, Blood Moon really needs to be in the main deck, but they were sitting happily in my Spiteclasm deck, which Matt took to 1-3.
Wednesday, May 20, 2015
Tuesday, May 19, 2015
Spiteclasm Decklist
For the past year(ish), I've been running a modern deck I designed. It's based on creatures like Spitemare and Boros Reckoner and damage-based soft board wipes, like Pyroclasm.
Some have asked for the decklist, so here is the current version:
4 Spitemare
4 Boros Reckoner
4 Pyroclasm
4 Whipflare
4 Volcanic Fallout
4 Earthquake
4 Magmaquake
1 Flame-Wreathed Phoenix
2 Skred
2 Blood Moon (I should probably have more)
4 Boros Signet
23 Snow-Covered Mountain
The board has more phoenixes, skreds, and also utility things like Yamabushi's Storm and Rolling Temblor.
The Skred/Snow-Covered Mountain combo was a suggestion by John J.
Another friend, Aaron D., alerted me to Humble Defector, which seems like it definitely needs to find a place in here. :)
This deck is super fun to play with! In it's first tournament, it went 3-1, and most recently I nearly won a tournament, but lost in the last round to the winner, one of my students.
Some have asked for the decklist, so here is the current version:
4 Spitemare
4 Boros Reckoner
4 Pyroclasm
4 Whipflare
4 Volcanic Fallout
4 Earthquake
4 Magmaquake
1 Flame-Wreathed Phoenix
2 Skred
2 Blood Moon (I should probably have more)
4 Boros Signet
23 Snow-Covered Mountain
The board has more phoenixes, skreds, and also utility things like Yamabushi's Storm and Rolling Temblor.
The Skred/Snow-Covered Mountain combo was a suggestion by John J.
Another friend, Aaron D., alerted me to Humble Defector, which seems like it definitely needs to find a place in here. :)
This deck is super fun to play with! In it's first tournament, it went 3-1, and most recently I nearly won a tournament, but lost in the last round to the winner, one of my students.
Thursday, February 5, 2015
Modern Witch-Maw Cascade
On Tuesday night I took a new deck to Double Midnight comics in Manchester, NH. (First time there!) The deck is WUBG and highly relies on the cascade mechanic. Here's the list:
5 Island
11 Forest
2 Early Harvest
2 Time warp
4 enlisted wurm
2 harmonize
2 gaea's blessing
3 unexpected results
4 search for tomorrow
4 sakura-tribe elder
The basic plan is to stall/control with captured sunlight, sakura-tribe elder, deny reality, and time warp, get some enlisted wurm and enigma sphinx out, then keep swinging while taking lots of turns. Taking lots of turns isn't too hard if the two gaea's blessings keep the deck cycling. The time warps and other cascade/utility cards will keep coming back and you'll have plenty of land to keep doing things.
Land is one of the exciting things about this deck. It's very easy on turn 7 to have 15 land on the board. There's no Explore, but the Search for Tomorrow and Sakura-Tribe Elder will help get lots of stuff out. And, since all the lands that stick around are basics, cascading into Early Harvest can double the length of an early turn. Unexpected Results often really nice, and whenever I played it, my opponents were actually pretty excited to see what I'd get.
Here's how it went down.
Round 1: Bye. Dang it! Is my rating that low? Matches: 1-0.
Round 2: I played Green (and Red?) Tron, which gets the Urza's lands going, and then drops big things. In game 1, I ended it pretty early, using Deny Reality to keep the Urzatron offline. I won with two Enlisted Wurms on the board and a Time Warp to hit for 20. Game 2 and 3 didn't go my way, though, with Urzatron sticking around and him getting him the fat beats. Emrakul killed me in game 3. Oof. Matches: 1-1, Games: 1-2
Round 3: Mono-green devotion/Genesis Wave had my number. Ouch. Two games quickly lost. My opponent, Thomas, was really nice and we played a bunch of games afterwards with me running my Pyroclasm-Reckoner deck. I won them all, but he kept really trying to take me down. Matches: 1-2, Games: 1-4.
Round 4: I played against Mono-white Hate-bears. Unfortunately, Leonin Arbiter is really good against all my fetching and Thalia is good against cascade. I did manage to win game 2 by paying for the searching on an early arbiter, and quickly ramping up. I couldn't keep up on game three, however. Matches: 1-3, Games: 2-6.
Round 5 (final): I lost two straight games to UB mill. I thought I'd be able to win easily due to Gaea's Blessing, but Nick was quick to Surgical Extraction those whenever I cast them. I did not think that I would ever be missing Whirlpool Warrior. I sided in two more blessings and 3 Serene Remebrances for game 2, but his sided Leyline of the Void was too much. Drat! I really thought I could pull that one off. Matches: 1-4, Games: 2-8.
The deck didn't fare as well as I'd hoped. The big problem is a lesson I haven't learned since playing a deck based around Time Stretch and Gurzigost at the Boston Regionals in 2003: taking lots of turns isn't a great win condition. This deck would probably be a lot better if the Time Warps were replaced with Bribery or something. Still, this deck is a lot of fun, and it was great to get a bunch of attention when the cascades started to go off.
2 Plains
2 Swamp11 Forest
2 misty rainforest
1 verdant catacombs
1 windswept heath
4 Captured Sunlight
4 deny reality
1 enigma sphinx
4 urban evolutionThe basic plan is to stall/control with captured sunlight, sakura-tribe elder, deny reality, and time warp, get some enlisted wurm and enigma sphinx out, then keep swinging while taking lots of turns. Taking lots of turns isn't too hard if the two gaea's blessings keep the deck cycling. The time warps and other cascade/utility cards will keep coming back and you'll have plenty of land to keep doing things.
Land is one of the exciting things about this deck. It's very easy on turn 7 to have 15 land on the board. There's no Explore, but the Search for Tomorrow and Sakura-Tribe Elder will help get lots of stuff out. And, since all the lands that stick around are basics, cascading into Early Harvest can double the length of an early turn. Unexpected Results often really nice, and whenever I played it, my opponents were actually pretty excited to see what I'd get.
Here's how it went down.
Round 1: Bye. Dang it! Is my rating that low? Matches: 1-0.
Round 2: I played Green (and Red?) Tron, which gets the Urza's lands going, and then drops big things. In game 1, I ended it pretty early, using Deny Reality to keep the Urzatron offline. I won with two Enlisted Wurms on the board and a Time Warp to hit for 20. Game 2 and 3 didn't go my way, though, with Urzatron sticking around and him getting him the fat beats. Emrakul killed me in game 3. Oof. Matches: 1-1, Games: 1-2
Round 3: Mono-green devotion/Genesis Wave had my number. Ouch. Two games quickly lost. My opponent, Thomas, was really nice and we played a bunch of games afterwards with me running my Pyroclasm-Reckoner deck. I won them all, but he kept really trying to take me down. Matches: 1-2, Games: 1-4.
Round 4: I played against Mono-white Hate-bears. Unfortunately, Leonin Arbiter is really good against all my fetching and Thalia is good against cascade. I did manage to win game 2 by paying for the searching on an early arbiter, and quickly ramping up. I couldn't keep up on game three, however. Matches: 1-3, Games: 2-6.
Round 5 (final): I lost two straight games to UB mill. I thought I'd be able to win easily due to Gaea's Blessing, but Nick was quick to Surgical Extraction those whenever I cast them. I did not think that I would ever be missing Whirlpool Warrior. I sided in two more blessings and 3 Serene Remebrances for game 2, but his sided Leyline of the Void was too much. Drat! I really thought I could pull that one off. Matches: 1-4, Games: 2-8.
The deck didn't fare as well as I'd hoped. The big problem is a lesson I haven't learned since playing a deck based around Time Stretch and Gurzigost at the Boston Regionals in 2003: taking lots of turns isn't a great win condition. This deck would probably be a lot better if the Time Warps were replaced with Bribery or something. Still, this deck is a lot of fun, and it was great to get a bunch of attention when the cascades started to go off.
Thursday, December 4, 2014
Planewalker Assassins
About a month ago we played a nice variant: Assassins. We had seven, which worked out to be a good number for this format.
The rules we used are very close to those laid out in this article, with a few major changes:
The rules we used are very close to those laid out in this article, with a few major changes:
- Players may target whomever they wish with spells and abilities.
- When one player kills another, they take their victim's card, getting a new target.
- Players may only attack their target. If they have their own name, they instead may attack anyone.
Cutthroat Magic
Cutthroat is a 3-player magic variant a friend taught to me that automatically extends to more-than-three variants, though it gets less fun if you have more than two opponents.
Basics
The basic rule is mostly simple: when you attack, you are attacking both opponents. They may "combo-block" however they want (technically declaring assignments in turn order if it comes down to it) and any damage that goes through is dealt to both of them. So, if I attack with three 1/1s, and my opponents each block one of them, then both players would take one damage.
That's it. Targetted effects can still go in any direction (Disintegrate doesn't hit them both). All players are considered each others' opponents for any other reason.
Details
Double-Damage?
Okay, so that's not all there is to it. Ophidian-effects (Ninja of the Deep Hours, etc) and lifelink should only trigger once.
Unresolved question: Do prevention-effects stop the damage for one player?
Who can attack?
If a creature cannot attack one of the two players (e.g. Teferi's Moat) then that creature cannot attack anyone.
Who can block?
If one defending player cannot block a creature (e.g. landwalk) the other defender's creatures are still allowed to block that creature.
I'm sure there are other issues that would need to be ironed out.
Basics
The basic rule is mostly simple: when you attack, you are attacking both opponents. They may "combo-block" however they want (technically declaring assignments in turn order if it comes down to it) and any damage that goes through is dealt to both of them. So, if I attack with three 1/1s, and my opponents each block one of them, then both players would take one damage.
That's it. Targetted effects can still go in any direction (Disintegrate doesn't hit them both). All players are considered each others' opponents for any other reason.
Details
Double-Damage?
Okay, so that's not all there is to it. Ophidian-effects (Ninja of the Deep Hours, etc) and lifelink should only trigger once.
Unresolved question: Do prevention-effects stop the damage for one player?
Who can attack?
If a creature cannot attack one of the two players (e.g. Teferi's Moat) then that creature cannot attack anyone.
Who can block?
If one defending player cannot block a creature (e.g. landwalk) the other defender's creatures are still allowed to block that creature.
I'm sure there are other issues that would need to be ironed out.
Monday, December 1, 2014
Conspiracy Emperor Draft
Last week we did a Conspiracy Emperor Draft. It was awesome. I highly recommend this format.
One thing might have made it better: splashing some Khans of Tarkir packs in there along with the Conspiracy.
... or maybe including Planechase cards.
... or maybe drafting anaconda style.
... or maybe something totally different!
Either way, it was a blast!
One thing might have made it better: splashing some Khans of Tarkir packs in there along with the Conspiracy.
... or maybe including Planechase cards.
... or maybe drafting anaconda style.
... or maybe something totally different!
Either way, it was a blast!
Sunday, March 31, 2013
A Limited EDH Attempt
Some friends and I decided to try an EDH draft yesterday. Here's what we decided to do:
* Draft 3 packs as usual.
* Choose any creature you drafted to be your general.
* Include all cards legal with that general in your deck. In other words, all cards that don't include colors or mana symbols not included in the general's colors and casting cost. Draft some green cards you don't want to use? Too bad; if your general is green then you have to include them.
* Each deck must have at least 40 cards. (As with regular EDH, your general doesn't count as one of those cards.)
* Ignore the Highlander part of EDH; if you draft multiple copies of the same card, include all of them in the deck.
We wacky drafted this (meaning use any 3 packs you want). Packs used included: Return to Ravnica, Gatecrash, Magic 2013, Avacyn Restored, Innistrad and Alara Reborn.
We then each built our deck and played three cutthroat EDH games. I ran a Grixis Grimblade deck for games 1 and 2 and switched to Bloodbraid Elf for game 3. Nathan's general was Bant Sureblade all three games. Victor chose Sewn-Eye Drake to lead his army in game 1 and Esper Sojourners in games 2 and 3. Victor wound up winning all three games!
Some interesting notes:
* Drafting a three-color creature was really vital, if only to make sure you have a deck with enough spells to fill out a deck. In the last game my red-green deck had only 16 spells. Oof.
* I had to run Vampiric Fury even though I had no vampires. :)
* Nathan had too many spells to stick to a 40-card deck. I think he wound up with about 44.
* The drafting part was really complicated. We allowed ourselves to review our previous picks at any time, which seems vital. I was often conflicted about whether to choose cards to go with Bloodbraid Elf or Grixis Grimblade. It was very tough.
* It was common to choose basic land over a spell to avoid taking something you did not want in your deck.
* Taking mono-colored creatures early on was good because they were more likely to fit in any deck (and creatures are good).
* 40 life per player may have been too much.
* Extort was way too powerful. We had exactly one extort card between the three of us and it was a powerhouse. This has been a problem with all multi-player limited formats I've seen, though.
* All three of us had a lot of fun! We will definitely do this again!
Things I would like to change for the next attempt:
* Draft 4 packs instead of 3. This might make it easier to play with 2-color generals (for those that don't have access to Alara-block packs). It should also help give players more general options.
* Draft Anaconda style. Want to change your entire strategy mid-pack? Go for it! Seriously, this sounds like a lot of fun.
* Lower the life point total to 30 or something like this.
* Lower the lethal general damage to 16 or something in that area.
Please let me know if you give this format a try or have ideas to improve it!
* Draft 3 packs as usual.
* Choose any creature you drafted to be your general.
* Include all cards legal with that general in your deck. In other words, all cards that don't include colors or mana symbols not included in the general's colors and casting cost. Draft some green cards you don't want to use? Too bad; if your general is green then you have to include them.
* Each deck must have at least 40 cards. (As with regular EDH, your general doesn't count as one of those cards.)
* Ignore the Highlander part of EDH; if you draft multiple copies of the same card, include all of them in the deck.
We wacky drafted this (meaning use any 3 packs you want). Packs used included: Return to Ravnica, Gatecrash, Magic 2013, Avacyn Restored, Innistrad and Alara Reborn.
We then each built our deck and played three cutthroat EDH games. I ran a Grixis Grimblade deck for games 1 and 2 and switched to Bloodbraid Elf for game 3. Nathan's general was Bant Sureblade all three games. Victor chose Sewn-Eye Drake to lead his army in game 1 and Esper Sojourners in games 2 and 3. Victor wound up winning all three games!
Some interesting notes:
* Drafting a three-color creature was really vital, if only to make sure you have a deck with enough spells to fill out a deck. In the last game my red-green deck had only 16 spells. Oof.
* I had to run Vampiric Fury even though I had no vampires. :)
* Nathan had too many spells to stick to a 40-card deck. I think he wound up with about 44.
* The drafting part was really complicated. We allowed ourselves to review our previous picks at any time, which seems vital. I was often conflicted about whether to choose cards to go with Bloodbraid Elf or Grixis Grimblade. It was very tough.
* It was common to choose basic land over a spell to avoid taking something you did not want in your deck.
* Taking mono-colored creatures early on was good because they were more likely to fit in any deck (and creatures are good).
* 40 life per player may have been too much.
* Extort was way too powerful. We had exactly one extort card between the three of us and it was a powerhouse. This has been a problem with all multi-player limited formats I've seen, though.
* All three of us had a lot of fun! We will definitely do this again!
Things I would like to change for the next attempt:
* Draft 4 packs instead of 3. This might make it easier to play with 2-color generals (for those that don't have access to Alara-block packs). It should also help give players more general options.
* Draft Anaconda style. Want to change your entire strategy mid-pack? Go for it! Seriously, this sounds like a lot of fun.
* Lower the life point total to 30 or something like this.
* Lower the lethal general damage to 16 or something in that area.
Please let me know if you give this format a try or have ideas to improve it!
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