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This thread is for discussion of this week's Serious Fun, which goes live Tuesday morning on magicthegathering.com.

'Tis Sim.

Great article! I do love me some lords, and definitely would love to play that Illusion deck.

No Prerelease or Release for me - I spent my self-allotted summer's "Magic allowance" on a Commander precon and changing it up to be more individualized. It was certainly worth it, as playing the same deck every week can be boring not just for me, but for opponents too!

I will miss out, though, as the recent Core Sets have been much more interesting than I usually consider Core Sets to be, M12 included.

I hate it when people don't read Dormant Gomazona right...you target yourself, not it, to untap it.  Maybe that's the sign of a bad design more than anything else, but still.  You could skip the whole thing with Guard Gomazoa, Gomazoa, and Warmonger's Chariot.

Turn one: island, phantasmal bear

Turn two: Island, lord of the unreal, swing for 3

Turn three: Grand architect, tap grand architect and lord of the unreal to play adaptive automaton, swing for 5

Turn four: Island, Phantasmal Dragon, tap grand architect, phantasmal dragon, and Lord of the Unreal for Wurmcoil engine

OR Turn four: Aether Figment, Phantasmal Illusion, tap 3 for caged sun

OR Turn four: tap 3 for caged sun, Jace's archivist and a kicked Aether Figment.


Anyone else Intimidated yet? 

The illusion deck I am building just got a little more nasty.

Jul 4, 2011 -- 11:33PM, upgraded wrote:

Anyone else Intimidated yet? 

I'm honestly not.
Sure, it looks like fun, but is not that deadly.
The automaton is quite worth anyone's attention, though. And not even in Standard, I think.

It should be illegal to build an Illusion deck without Krovikan Mist .

I'm not sure if I should be happy with M11. I really am happy that my Illusion deck will become that much stronger, but there's this tiny nagging voice in the back of my head saying "But now Illusions are mainstream. Noone will think you're original anymore."

Ah, the trials and trepidations of a Johnny.

I want more support for allies.  Thank you.

This seems good with Slivers.

Any word on what the White lord is gonna be yet though? Some of the spoilers I have seen suggest there won't be one, which seems odd, since aren't core sets lords usually printed similar to a cycle? 

The Elf Warriors deck looks like fun. My first ext deck was elves, so I kind of like them. But what I'd change, I'd add Joraga Warcaller , he usually gives the elves more than just +1/+1 and through cycling Hunting Triad he can get even more counters... And also Bramblewood Paragon gives hime one more and trample. It was the idea of my first elf deck, to combo Joraga Warcaller with Bramblewood Paragon and Immaculate Magistrate but I couldn't get the Immaculates anywhere so I gave up...

As for this week's poll. I'm definitely going to the prerelease. I'm quite fond of red now so I hope to open Chandra, the Firebrand or at least Furyborn Hellkite . We'll see about that 

"It's the first lord creature for the vast majority of creature types. Construct, Octopus, Nephilim, and every other creature type that has languished without a lord now has one. (Yes, I'm ignoring Brass Herald. Work with me a little here!)"

Not only are you ignoring Brass Herald , you're also ignoring Mistform Warchief :P How's that for a forgotten Lord from the past?

(There's also Shared Triumph , Cover of Darkness , Steely Resolve and so on. But those aren't creatures, so they don't count.)

Brass Herald is a very nostalgic card for me. When it came out, I immediately combed Standard-at-the-time (Invasion and Masques blocks) for fun creatures types to build decks around. I had Griffins, Giants, Wizards (which was the only creature type Sunscape Battlemage and friends had), and so on. Giants Tribal in post-Apocalypse Standard was quite silly: it's a white-red deck which makes Wayfarer Giant small, and they keep blowing one another up with Desolation Giant and Bloodfire Colossus . And the mana curve was horrible. Ah, fun times

The guy on the last page who pointed out this is nice with Slivers has a point. On the surface it looks like just another Muscle Sliver / Sinew Sliver / Sedge Sliver , and it wouldn't be bad if it were just one of them; but it's colourless which can be quite a big deal in a five-colour Sliver deck with a wonky mana base.

Jul 5, 2011 -- 3:14AM, alextfish wrote:

The guy on the last page who pointed out this is nice with Slivers has a point. On the surface it looks like just another Muscle Sliver / Sinew Sliver / Sedge Sliver , and it wouldn't be bad if it were just one of them; but it's colourless which can be quite a big deal in a five-colour Sliver deck with a wonky mana base.

Adaptive Automaton has some pros in a Sliver deck but also some definite cons that will keep it out of my Sliver deck.

 Pros:
Colorless
Grants the bonus only to your creatures
Able to block creatures with Fear or Intimidate

Cons:
Can't be found by Homing Sliver or Sliver Overlord
Gets destroyed if you or your opponent are running Harmonic Sliver (unless you have a Crystalline Sliver out) 

Adaptive Automaton needs "changeling" so you can add it into more specific decks like rebels, mercenaries, etc. If I can't search for him via Treefolk Harbinger , I won't put him into such a tribal deck.

The same was true for Training Grounds , as this should have been a colorless creature with "changeling" too.

I'd like to see an octopus deck.

Jul 5, 2011 -- 12:39AM, Tmoiy wrote:

This seems good with Slivers.

Do Slivers really need lords 9-12? Though it is colorless.....

Jul 5, 2011 -- 1:22AM, MirranforLife wrote:

Any word on what the White lord is gonna be yet though? Some of the spoilers I have seen suggest there won't be one, which seems odd, since aren't core sets lords usually printed similar to a cycle? 

From what I can tell this takes the place of the white lord. 

Jul 5, 2011 -- 7:49AM, Cheza wrote:

Adaptive Automaton needs "changeling" so you can add it into more specific decks like rebels, mercenaries, etc. If I can't search for him via Treefolk Harbinger , I won't put him into such a tribal deck.

The same was true for Training Grounds , as this should have been a colorless creature with "changeling" too.

There should be a price to pay for a ubiquitous 'lord' creature. Some tribes are simply less cohesive, and should have fewer and / or weaker cards that support them. How boring would it be if every creature type got the same treatment as goblins and elves? Insufferable. The better-supported tribes have enough 'lords' to choose from already, so it's hardly a loss that you can't draw the Automaton off your Goblin Ringleader . I'd also imagine that Johnnies don't want their obscure tribal decks to come together so easily, lest the 'mainstream' deck builders catch on.

You could have made Dormant Gormozoa much more cohesive by simply changing out a few of your draw spells - Preordain becomes Portent; Mind Spring becomes Blue Sun's Zenith.

In reference to the poll:  I will not be attending as there seem to be no Prereleases on military bases in Iraq.

I still have a few days to decide whether to order M12 to play out here or not.