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Magic: the GAFering |OT2|

Haly

One day I realized that sadness is just another word for not enough coffee.
You have half of a creature sacrifice engine in there. The other half you're missing is the creatures. You also seem to have 62 cards.

Deathrite Shaman: It doesn't really do anything for your deck. Rather than try to remove the lands and sorceries from your graveyard, you should play less of them altogether.

Codex Shredder: Bad all around. I'd rather see another decent creature in this slot like Llanowar Elves or Young Wolf (which you can sacrifice twice)

Bone Splinters: No no no. Most of the time, you'll get more value out of straight up removal.
Skylasher: It's a blue hoser some of the time and a 2/2 for 2 most of the time. There are a lot of better creatures you can probably put in this slot.

Blood Artist: Should be 4. Artists are amazing and the more the better.

Corpestraders: Really slow card, and you're going to wind up sacrificing it eventually anyway.

Savra: I assume this is kitchen table magic?

Vraska: Vraska doesn't really fit in here. She's cool but there are better planeswalkers for a creature based strategy. For example, Garruk Relentless is only 4 mana, and it creates Wolves for you to attack with/sacrifice, and costs the same as Vraska.

Deadbridge Chant: Cards like Deadbridge Chant are awkward to play with because it takes a long time to set them up and they don't win you the game immediately. So the key point is to get to 6 mana as soon as possible or stall for as long as possible and your deck isn't really built for either of that. Also, every non-creature card in your deck makes Deadbridge weaker.

Take a look at this deck (scroll down to Sepulchral Strength). The key to a good creature sacrifice deck is quantity and value. Stuff like Viridian Emissary gets you a land when you sacrifice it, helping you ramp up. Creakwood Liege generates an army of 3/3s AND pumps up all your other guys, only for 4 mana. Golgari Germination gives you free 1/1s when you sacrifice your non-token guys, which you can sacrifice again, nearly doubling your sacrifices. Your sacrifice outlets (that is, the cards that enable you to sacrifice on demand) are very expensive. Ideally, a sacrifice outlet should be totally free so you have flexibility during combat and blocking.

Here are the parts of a creature sacrifice deck:

Creatures: Lots of them. Ones with on death effects are especially good. If you have some sort of recursion, then Enter-the-battlefield effects also really good. Generally, you want cards whose value is split between their P/T and their abilities, because you're going to be killing them off. Cards that replace themselves, either by getting you more cards or leaving behind a creature (or even coming back as in the case with Undying or Persist) are especially good here.

Sacrifice Outlet: This is a creature or enchantment that you use to sacrifice anything you have out. It should be free, instant speed, with a moderately strong effect.

Sacrifice Value: Blood Artist is hands down the best for this.

Finisher: A lot of cards work off of your graveyard and those should be your game enders. Deadbridge Chant is okay, but pretty slow. Something like Sewer Nemesis or Mortivore are better. They're cheaper, they grow as you sacrifice, and they can be sacrificed themselves in a pinch.

Some cards you should consider for this deck:

Garruk Relentless (in place of Vraska)
Viridian Emissary
Creakwood Liege
Solemn Simulacrum
Golgari Grave-Troll (actually you can just build her a dredge deck)
Sakira-tribe Elder


Oh it has to be Standard legal. Welp, ignore.
 

kirblar

Member
So I've been testing the all-in Splinter Twin deck that top 8'd the last GP on MTGO. How did nobody else realize that Boomerang is nuts in that deck until now? You can do some degenerate things with that card on the play.

This happened to me last night:

T1: Land, go. He plays fetchland, go.
T2: Land, go. He cracks his fetch, gets a tapped shockland. I Boomerang it. He replays it tapped, says go.
T3: Land, go. On his upkeep, Exarch his land. He plays a fetchland, says go.
T4: Land, Splinter Twin, win the game.

It wasn't even close. The only problem with that play was that I put him on the wrong deck and boarded incorrectly for game two and lost to a million Valakut triggers, but game three a Boomerang on Valakut itself was enough to seal the match.
Ban. Twin. Watch the relief on people's faces as they can play more tap-out orientedstrategies. It's such an oppressive force in the format.
 
Ban. Twin. Watch the relief on people's faces as they can play more tap-out orientedstrategies. It's such an oppressive force in the format.

You could say that about any combo deck in any format really. If you tap out against it, you lose. It seems to me that it's doing so well right now because the control decks aren't otherwise well positioned.
 

kirblar

Member
You could say that about any combo deck in any format really. If you tap out against it, you lose. It seems to me that it's doing so well right now because the control decks aren't otherwise well positioned.
Twin's "minus one your mana" shenanigans limits your interaction abilities against it in the early game.
 

rCIZZLE

Member
People are too quick to call for bans. Losing the trust of your players by crushing their investment into a format does much more harm than a few combo decks.
 

rCIZZLE

Member
It's not "a few". That's the problem. The format was 50% combo.

Seems like it's just the same few that are putting up good results. Many of which seem like they're weak to hand disruption or graveyard hate or both. Why not just support the printing of more combo hate instead of suggesting people lose their investment and a deck they enjoy playing because the metagame isn't exactly what you want it to be?

For instance, the printing of cards like Rest in Peace, Terminus, and Deathrite Shaman made life as a dredge player much more difficult but it's much better that than banning a key piece like Narcomoeba or Bridge.
 

siddx

Magnificent Eager Mighty Brilliantly Erect Registereduser
Does anyone else with Magic 2014 notice that the planeswalker for Ravinca, Zorislav, looks a lot like grumpy cat? It's a remarkable likeness.

Also I hope we get Mr. crazy evil hermit bearded guy as a planeswalker next set.
 
Do the financially-minded fellas among us want to venture a guess as to the future of Voice of Resurgence? I have been telling myself that, with patience, a set can eventually be snagged on eBay for $130 and,although there have been a few close calls, every auction winds up just 5 or so bucks over what I'm comfortable spending. I waited for the bubble to burst on Reckoners before getting in for relatively cheap, but it just doesn't seem like much Dragon's Maze is getting opened and we're heading into the release of M14 to further stunt sales. Can this card realistically stay over $40 for the long haul? The nightmare scenario would be waiting only for Wizards to not print serviceable replacements for Pillar of Flame of Terminus in Theros, making the card climb even higher (even typing this, I can see how silly it is to complain about the price when I could easily skip the proverbial Big Mac for a day and just pay the going rate).

Anyway, as long as I don't have Voices to play with, it seems like a good time to break from being a bad player playing good decks and enjoy being a bad player playing bad decks for a bit:

Have any of you seen or done interesting things with Master of Cruelties? I've been passively contemplating a RWB deck with him as the focal point today and there seem to be some fun possibilities. I would like to play him with one-sided sweeper effects like Bonfire/Aurelia's Fury/Mutilate. Blind Obedience can help counteract the ridiculous hasting RG and blitz decks a bit while serving as a convenient way to score that last point of damage after an MoC swing. With MoC, Devour Flesh becomes a strictly better Diabolic Edict. I love the way these work together, but have the usual deckbuilding problem of wanting an alternate path to victory (a Blood Baron or something similar) which then makes the original plan seem kinda bad. As exciting as an excuse to use Blood Baron would be, it couldn't compare to Mutilating for 3 to clear all the blockers and then attacking my opponent down to 1 life with a -2/1 Master of Cruelties. Whatever. It's not supposed to be competitive, but I'd like it to function as well as possible. Any ideas for further support cards? Or win conditions that aren't so starkly opposed to the MoC plan?
 
People bitched endlessly about the titans. How broken and overpowered they were (while they of course played with them anyway).

The titans were bad for the game. Much of the "meh" and "boring" among players from the past year or two of previews comes from "this isn't a Titan! WTF"

They represent an unsustainable level of power creep, as well as just being generally derpy creatures. The cycle might have been fine without Primeval Titan, and possibly Grave Titan & Inferno Titan. Sun Titan is fun in older formats (EDH, Vintage) while being tolerable in Standard, and Frost Titan is almost... fair.
 

OnPoint

Member
Do the financially-minded fellas among us want to venture a guess as to the future of Voice of Resurgence? I have been telling myself that, with patience, a set can eventually be snagged on eBay for $130 and,although there have been a few close calls, every auction winds up just 5 or so bucks over what I'm comfortable spending. I waited for the bubble to burst on Reckoners before getting in for relatively cheap, but it just doesn't seem like much Dragon's Maze is getting opened and we're heading into the release of M14 to further stunt sales. Can this card realistically stay over $40 for the long haul? The nightmare scenario would be waiting only for Wizards to not print serviceable replacements for Pillar of Flame of Terminus in Theros, making the card climb even higher (even typing this, I can see how silly it is to complain about the price when I could easily skip the proverbial Big Mac for a day and just pay the going rate).

I think Voice being as high as it is still is ridiculous, and that's coming from someone with a playset. It should have never been printed at mythic. Unless something comes along that totally neuters its effectiveness, however, I don't know if we'll see it drop until potentially Theros.

Anyway, as long as I don't have Voices to play with, it seems like a good time to break from being a bad player playing good decks and enjoy being a bad player playing bad decks for a bit:

Have any of you seen or done interesting things with Master of Cruelties? I've been passively contemplating a RWB deck with him as the focal point today and there seem to be some fun possibilities. I would like to play him with one-sided sweeper effects like Bonfire/Aurelia's Fury/Mutilate. Blind Obedience can help counteract the ridiculous hasting RG and blitz decks a bit while serving as a convenient way to score that last point of damage after an MoC swing. With MoC, Devour Flesh becomes a strictly better Diabolic Edict. I love the way these work together, but have the usual deckbuilding problem of wanting an alternate path to victory (a Blood Baron or something similar) which then makes the original plan seem kinda bad. As exciting as an excuse to use Blood Baron would be, it couldn't compare to Mutilating for 3 to clear all the blockers and then attacking my opponent down to 1 life with a -2/1 Master of Cruelties. Whatever. It's not supposed to be competitive, but I'd like it to function as well as possible. Any ideas for further support cards? Or win conditions that aren't so starkly opposed to the MoC plan?

I've long considered building a Grixis MoC deck, using the obvious Artful Dodge route. However, access to blue gives you all kinds of fun toys, like Unsummon, Cyclonic Rift, or Tricks of the Trade if you're really digging for a way to get him through. My dream scenario is to hit with the Master, then burn them out with direct damage.
 

Sinatar

Official GAF Bottom Feeder
Voice is already seeing plenty of play in Modern and I wouldn't be surprised to see it in legacy. It's not going to drop, even after rotation.
 

hoverX

Member
So I've been playing the magic ios game for a bit and I think I'm going to take the plunge and get into playing magic at my local store. What's the best way to get a good deck. Drafts? Buy an intro pack and fat pack? Buy a booster box? I'm not opposed to dropping a bit of cash but not looking to buy a deck for $400 or anything...

Also, I'm not a pro at the rules so I don't want to hit up an event where I'll get bitched at for not knowing every single aspect of the game.
 

bigkrev

Member
So I've been playing the magic ios game for a bit and I think I'm going to take the plunge and get into playing magic at my local store. What's the best way to get a good deck. Drafts? Buy an intro pack and fat pack? Buy a booster box? I'm not opposed to dropping a bit of cash but not looking to buy a deck for $400 or anything...

Also, I'm not a pro at the rules so I don't want to hit up an event where I'll get bitched at for not knowing every single aspect of the game.

Go to the draft at your local store. Let people know that you are just getting into the game- most experienced players will let you have their "draft droppings" (everything they draft minus the rares), which should give you a decent start to a collection. I'd grab one of the Deckbuilder Toolkits (comes with enough lands to build decks), and experiment with what you like.

As far as rules go, the only one I think you need to hammer into your head is Untap-Upkeep-Draw. Make sure you get your upkeep effects done before drawing your card each turn!
 

zoukka

Member
BZB2BCzt9Q_EN.jpg

Ah dem Rotlung Reanimator memories...
 

zoukka

Member
I just now watched the M14 spoilers.

Why do Slivers suddenly look like the Eldrazi...

Holy shit there's an actual great looking new art in one of the cards! Colour me surprised.

nKvQljeSXh_EN.jpg


Another card with nice art.

an0h9JPB1t_EN.jpg



THE FUCK I DIDN'T REALISE THE ARTIST DID BOTH OF THESE I SWEAR :b

Blessed be this Yeong-Hao!
 

MjFrancis

Member
http://media.wizards.com/images/magic/tcg/products/m14/poi798sjkasd/nKvQljeSXh_EN.jpg[IMG]

Another card with nice art.

[IMG]http://media.wizards.com/images/magic/tcg/products/m14/poi798sjkasd/an0h9JPB1t_EN.jpg[IMG]


THE FUCK I DIDN'T REALISE THE ARTIST DID BOTH OF THESE I SWEAR :b

Blessed be this Yeong-Hao![/QUOTE]I noticed Yeong-Hao did my favorite Return to Ravnica land illustrations. I'll have to keep an eye out for his specific work. It's pretty good.
 
So apparently some older keywords got errata'd in the Gatherer update. Convoke and Delve now have new reminder text that allows you to generate mana to pay for the spells rather than reduce the cost of the spells. See Chord of Calling and Logic Knot for examples.

Relevant? Probably not. But interesting (to me anyway). Also makes me wonder if that's somehow foreshadowing the return of one of those keywords...
 

ultron87

Member
Ooh Strionic Resonator + Isochron Scepter type triggers lets you cast both exiled cards every activation. Fun times.

And the new temporary exile template on the new Fiend Hunter and the whale gets you your stuff back in multiplayer when that player dies unlike O-ring. Finally my dream of ruining someone by putting a Phage under one of those things actually works,
 
So I finally decided to build that Modern UG Elves deck that I got so excited about when Beck // Call was spoiled. I knew it wasn't terribly good against Modern's love affair with Lightning Bolt, but I figured - heck, let's try it out for funsies.

It turns out that the deck is unplayable on MTGO. Completely. I take game one against Blue Tron...after spending 15 minutes comboing off. Since MTGO won't auto-yield with mana in your pool, you can't auto-untap your Nettle Sentinels or auto-bounce with Curio. There is absolutely no way to play this deck online without getting serious hand cramps.
 

Azn_Boy

Neo Member
So I finally decided to build that Modern UG Elves deck that I got so excited about when Beck // Call was spoiled. I knew it wasn't terribly good against Modern's love affair with Lightning Bolt, but I figured - heck, let's try it out for funsies.

It turns out that the deck is unplayable on MTGO. Completely. I take game one against Blue Tron...after spending 15 minutes comboing off. Since MTGO won't auto-yield with mana in your pool, you can't auto-untap your Nettle Sentinels or auto-bounce with Curio. There is absolutely no way to play this deck online without getting serious hand cramps.

There were people who could play Eggs on MTGO lol.
 

Sinatar

Official GAF Bottom Feeder
Yea MTGO is pretty punishing to combo decks.

Oh you want to gain infinite life melira pod? Have at it. You let me know when you think you've earned enough life and then we'll play the rest of this out.
 

noquarter

Member
Yeah, combo can be pretty bad on MTGO, one of the reason's I don't like playing Modern on there. I am also the type that will make them go through everything and make sure they hit everything correctly, won't just concede, even if game three, since I could still win if they misplay.
 
The only combo deck I play seriously on MTGO is Twin, and it's not that hard to make 20-25 iterations reasonably quickly.

A feature I've often wished for is a "macro recorder" for MTGO. During a match, you open up a special window, press record, execute one iteration of a loop, and press stop. You can then press go on the macro to execute the loop again with one click, auto-yielding unless your opponent does something in the middle of the macro.

For deterministic loop-based combos, it would make the games infinitely better. You don't have to execute a million loops naturally, and your opponent doesn't have to sit and wait to see if you misclick once. If you observe him do the loop correctly once, you know he'll do it correctly again indefinitely, so no need to waste your time waiting. Which is of course how it works in paper - if your opponent demonstrates an "infinite" combo loop once, you have to let him shortcut as many iterations as he wants unless you have a way to interrupt.

It wouldn't make decks like Eggs or Storm better, but infinite combos could actually be infinite. And it would go a long way towards making the online metagame closer to the paper metagame, which I think is good for the game as a whole.
 
FUUUUUUUUUUU! I just threw away a guaranteed win in the finals of a Modern daily event by accidentally clicking a Pestermite instead of a Kiki-Jiki. I guess that's why my opponent made me play it out.

3-1 instead of 4-0. Admittedly, I shouldn't have won anyway; I was way behind on board, and had one shot at a 7 outs left in a 38 card library (18% chance to draw it).

I've always been very careful to execute that combo correctly - somehow my hand just slipped and I threw away five packs of value for nothing. FML.
 
Hello everyone. I'm looking to get back into Magic and am curious if any of you would recommend any of the pre-con decks as a solid base to build on or should I just try to build a deck from scratch?
 

WanderingWind

Mecklemore Is My Favorite Wrapper
Hello everyone. I'm looking to get back into Magic and am curious if any of you would recommend any of the pre-con decks as a solid base to build on or should I just try to build a deck from scratch?

Muhahahahahahahahaha

Want a fuck ton of free cards? Pm me your address and pay for shipping. Same to anybody else
 

ultron87

Member
Hello everyone. I'm looking to get back into Magic and am curious if any of you would recommend any of the pre-con decks as a solid base to build on or should I just try to build a deck from scratch?

Are you looking to play just with friends and whatnot or in a more competitive environment?
 
Are you looking to play just with friends and whatnot or in a more competitive environment?

I'm aiming to keep my decks on the legal side of play. None of my old decks were legal in any sense of the word and I don't have much experience with Drafts and tourneys so I'm looking to get into that scene a little.

My local comic shop has FNM and hosts drafts occasionally so I'm going to start going to those. I'm mainly looking to refamiliarize myself with the game and any new mechanics that have come along. I haven't played in going on 8 years now.

I preferred blue counter heavy decks when I used to play. The last mechanic I remember before taking a break was storm if that tells you anything.
 

red13th

Member
I'm aiming to keep my decks on the legal side of play. None of my old decks were legal in any sense of the word and I don't have much experience with Drafts and tourneys so I'm looking to get into that scene a little.

My local comic shop has FNM and hosts drafts occasionally so I'm going to start going to those. I'm mainly looking to refamiliarize myself with the game and any new mechanics that have come along. I haven't played in going on 8 years now.

I preferred blue counter heavy decks when I used to play. The last mechanic I remember before taking a break was storm if that tells you anything.

You should probably buy singles and make a cheap Standard-legal deck, I believe that's the format at most FNMs. Check the Standard section at the mtgsalvation forums to have an idea of what's being played.
If I recall correctly, current Standard-legal sets are Innistrad block, Return to Ravnica block, M13 and M14.
Sadly blue draw-go control is no longer a thing in modern Magic.
 

The Technomancer

card-carrying scientician
You should probably buy singles and make a cheap Standard-legal deck, I believe that's the format at most FNMs. Check the Standard section at the mtgsalvation forums to have an idea of what's being played.
If I recall correctly, current Standard-legal sets are Innistrad block, Return to Ravnica block, M13 and M14.
Sadly blue draw-go control is no longer a thing in modern Magic.

While this is true, Innistrad is rotating out in just a couple months, so he may want to build a deck that mostly uses RTR and M14 cards if he can find one.
 

red13th

Member
Yes, that's right, we're very close to Standard rotating! Maybe wait until Theros is released (I think it's out in September) before building your deck.
 
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