cavern has really shifted the rock-paper-scissors of magic. things that are beating certain things are things that should not be winning against those decks, as in, deck A is beating deck B, even though traditionally, B should nearly always beat A. cavern is allowing things to happen that should not be allowed to happen.
Personally, I like the way cavern has shaken things up. You should actually have to play the games to know what's going to happen. Blue was way too powerful in my opinion, as counterspells could be an answer just about any threat, and there wasn't a whole lot you could do to stop it. Yea, I can make you use all your counterspells and maybe cast somthing later in the game, but how many times has your delver hit me already? It was too powerful against too many things, and too many people were exploiting that.
Another reason I think they wanted to nerf blue a bit is because to many people, myself included, it's boring and frustrating to play against a deck that doesn't let you play back.
As stated in several other posts, cavern does have its weaknesses, and you can always counter cavern with ghost quarter if you hate it that much :P
Standard needs cavern because blue has dissipate , which is a 3-mana answer to ANYTHING. Combined with cancel , blue simply has the only omni-answers. Every other color has answers to some things, but not to others (at least, not all in one 3-mana spell.) Interaction may be a sacred cow on these forums, but draw-go promotes a stagnant boardstate that really isn't a fun matchup. There's nothing interesting or fun about a boardstate that doesn't change turn after turn after turn,
Ghost Quarter : because Blue needs to adapt to new things too. Counters have traditionally not cared about new strategies, since it could be countered. I personally think it's high time "learn to play around it" finally cuts both ways.
blue has to be able to answer anything since things worth countering these days are insanely powerful and diverse. that plus blue doesn't have any true removal, just temporary set backs.
caverning your thragtusk means that blue can't really do much of anything right now. it seems like sphinx's revelation is the only reason anyone has to play blue at the moment.
Blue is the best color ever. How do you deal?
Team GFG - "gulf, foxtrot, gulf" Twitter: Burning_Forest
blue has to be able to answer anything since things worth countering these days are insanely powerful and diverse. that plus blue doesn't have any true removal, just temporary set backs.
caverning your thragtusk means that blue can't really do much of anything right now. it seems like sphinx's revelation is the only reason anyone has to play blue at the moment.
This^^
All of this was discussed to death when Cavern was first spoiled, and I have no desire to type out another 20 some pages (like I did last time) explaining why Counterspells are NOT too broad an answer. Not like anyone will listen if I did anyways.
So lets all just jump on the "Counterspells are too powerful and not fun" bandwagon because we have absolutely no idea how to play around them, or that they have inherent weaknesses in a means unlike 90% of the other answers available....
I mean, that is what everyone else is doing.......right?
"I have existed from the morning of the world and I shall exist until the last star falls from the night. Although I have taken the form of Gaius Caligula, I am all men as I am no man and therefore I am a God."
Long put short, Counters are broader answers than what other colors have because you can only cast them when your opponent casts the spell. Doom Blade is always relevant to draw. Cancel is not.
Yeah... Until next game, where it'll be right back.
Seriously, there's no way to deal with Rancor in any format. It should be banned, except Gleemax is a lobbyist for the Rancor party, so that'll never happen.
You can't ban rancor, it just returns to your deck.
You might want to actually talk to the Flavor & Storyline Board people... since, you know, our whole reason for playing Magic is the flavor. I'm willing to bet you'll get a lot more interest there than in General.
Indeed, both posters down there would be thrilled.
When talks about banning Jace first started, I was thinking that I would see him banned come June 20th. But as I think more about it, I don't really think that Jace is the problem anymore. Sure his power level leaves very little to the imagination (opening Jace is like opening a refrigerator box with a naked girl on the inside), and sure his price does have a strong impact on what players choose to play (playing Jace is like being intimate with a woman and she doesn't charge you in the morning), but it is not the source of all the problems in Standard.
How do people think saving room to print more abilities on cards is dumbing down the game?
Do you really think, say, Akroma would ever be printed if she said, "Akroma can block by creatures with this ability and cannot be blocked by creatures without this ability. If a creature without this ability would deal combat damage by Akroma would be destroyed, prevent all combat damage that creature would deal to Akroma this combat. Attacking does not cause Akroma to tap. If Akroma is blocked and deals lethal damage, it deals the remainder of its damage to the defending player. Akroma may attack and use abilities that require tapping in the casting cost the turn it enters the battlefield. Akroma cannot be damaged, enchanted, equipped, blocked or targeted by black or red sources" rather than her "dumbed down" wording she has? No freaking way. Keywording and shorthand allows them to make complicated cards easy to play with, allowing them to be printed in the first place.
1. cast frankie peanuts 2. ask opponent "will you concede the game this turn"? if they say yes, you win; if they say no, play a staying power 3. subsequently ask "will you attack this turn"? and "will you cast a spell this turn"? (using a Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir for the second question if necessary) to ensure they can't disrupt the combo 4. donate them a platinum angel 5. play a mox lotus and braingeyser them for every card in their library. play an opalescence and donate them a glorious anthem and a blacker lotus , then play enchanted evening . play and activate a mindslaver and then donate them a fastbond and the mox lotus (returning one of the donates to your hand with eternal witness or whatever) 6. during their turn, play every permanent in their hand (playing lands with fastbond) then (as yourself) cast mirrorweave on the blacker lotus, so every permanent becomes a copy of it. proceed to tear up every card they control, and hopefully do it before they notice that they aren't bound by staying power's ability anymore and can concede
Dark Ritual being overpowered is determined more by what is done with it than the card itself.
True, but the fact that it enables so many ridiculous things is pretty telling. It's like, sure I can use a shotgun as a bludgeoning instrument, but that doesn't make it not a shotgun.
Shortly before Serra died, she transferred her spark into an angel whose full name was Asha Avacyn Bolas. Her dragon father groomed her for her positions in Alara and Innistrad, and she's also been getting help from her uncle Ugin in the form of Urza, who was resurrected as Marit Lage to be the avatar as which she projects herself into material realms. Grieslbrand is a split personality who sometimes wanders the planes disguised as a human woman named Liliana Vess.
Everyone's life would be easier if players would, instead of coming to the 'net for help with a deck, just netdeck and be done with it. And I'm not talking about some Top 8 lists, for the Casualists, too, can benefit from netdecking. I've netdecked plenty of decks from the Casual Play forums from users such as Mown, Raedien, Floopfoot, and a few others. I snatched straight the heck out of my web browser. Yes, people, your original idea fell victim to a savage netdecker. You have been assimiliated.
Suppose I wanted a Zombie deck. Why on earth would I spend time searching Gatherer for a decent list of Zombie cards when Raedien already did it for me? Taking time to be creative or waiting on people on the forums to tell you why your deck sucks or 'go to Casual forums' is a disasterous waste of time (to me).
That being said, Magic was ruined back in Alpha when they added all that rules and cards [Debutantes avert your eyes]. My friends and I still like playing it the "pure" way (Basically we go into the woods and hit eachother with wiffle bats while shouting made up obscenities. You know, the way Garfield wanted it to be played).
Don't worry about it. I've come up with a list of changes to fix EDH.
-First off, there's no commander. -The minimum deck size is 60 cards, and each deck can have up to four of each card, save basic lands and relentless rats. Also decks have no color identity. -Starting life total is 20.
Here's a clever play you can try yourself: -Convince friend to run relentless rats.dec in legacy tournament -Get a deck with lots of mill, yixlid jailer, and humility -Drop humility and jailer, wait for him to dump his hand, mill him out -All his rats now have no abilities. Call a judge because he's playing an illegal deck with more than 4 of a single card. -Get him/her banned from competitive magic play
L, is for the leather gloves you weaaaar. O, is for the organs that guy could spaaaare. V, is very very, extraordinay. E, is for every vagrant i butchered in a wine cellar befooooore.
The outer layer of the Magic: the Gathering box, the carton, or crust, is fairly thin and light, and contains largely aluminosilcates.
Within that lies the middle layer, consisting of the familiar booster pack. Although solid, the booster packs' high temperatures allow them to acutally move around within the booster box. This flow, sometimes called convection, is cited by frustrated box mappers as one of WOTC's most genious uses of thermodynamics since the Ravnica block.
No one knows what lies at the core of the booster box, but scientists theorize that it must be especially dense in order to make up for the large amount of fluff distributed amongst the booster packs.
I imagine [Ajani 3's] second ability involves him hurling the creature at your opponent Brion Stoutarm style, then the guy is just like "Okay, that may have worked, but don't- GOD DAMN IT!" as he does it again because cats don't give a **** :33.
Its like that one time Elves broke out in a field of Jund. Elves became a resurgent hit, then died off again once Jund adapted to the rest of the field of G/W that it required mass removal that inherently pooped on Elves too.
Submit to the menace. Delver can, and will blot out the sun.
"I remember my days as a youth at Tolarian Academy ." "Wow, small multiverse, I actually went there too." "WAIT, DON'T- Well ****, there's $200,000 in student loans well spent."
And flavor goes out the window when you cast a second copy of a planeswalker right after the first one dies, so...
"Hey Nissa, I need a favor." "You just asked me for a 'favor' like thirty seconds ago, and it turned out to be having Sarkhan Transmogrify my only follower into a dragon like 5 times -which dickery aside also violates some laws of causality - and then you let me get beaten over the head by that hedron crab." "...I'll give you " "...Well all right then."
GM, I don't think Dill is better than you. I KNOW it. Even if he wakes up every morning, clubs a baby seal, steals all the TV remotes from within a block's radius of his house and then robs hungry orphans of their food he'd be better than you, for the simple reason that he learns from his mistakes.
What would they have to fight about? Like, all I can think of now is Gideon going "Hey, long-ears! I'm gathering a group of 'Walkers together to fight some tentacle monsters.....you want in?" and Tamiyo going "Ew! Hentai no bakka Gideon-desu desu!" and flying away.
I open 4 packs just to be on the safe side. Not only do I get more cards than everyone else, but I also get to spend the rest of the night off. Win Win.
MaRo has a thing for people opening boosters with bad cards. But since he can only get so many bad cards printed in each set, he has found a devious way of getting more bad cards into circulation: He makes entire print sheets with just bad rares, then puts them onto the assembly line. He proceeds to wring his hands and twirl his evil mustache that he grew for twirling purposes as a lightning bolt strikes in the background. Afterwards, he goes to make sure that the good cards are only opened by everyone's friends, and that we all only get to open bad cards. He does this by memorising each booster, than switching them around accordingly. Whenever someone complains about a card, he immediately jumps out from behind a chair to yell "WELL, IT'S NOT FOR YOU!" before merging back into the shadows in order to devise new ways in which he can screw over players, then claim that he has valid reasons for doing so.
Mark Rosewater is sitting in a seemingly innocuous cable TV van, outside of Bankaimastery's house. Sitting nearby are two hardened criminal hackers, fresh out of prison, and filled with resentment at their lack of physical fitness. "Have you managed to hack his brainwaves yet? The set deadline's coming up fast." "We're almost through. It should be coming up on the screen any second." The hacker presses a button, and Kevin's thoughts flash onto the screen. Mark and the hackers stare in amazement at the sheer beauty, the elegance, and the raw truth of what they see. It's like the ending to 2001: A Space Odyssey. Brilliant light shines across the screen, the truth of existence is made clear to them, and they despair at their own foolishness, their own ignorance, their own inadequacy. And then they steal his ideas. As they return back to R&D, Mark sneers at a haggard old man chained to a cast-iron sphere. The man looks up from his laborious task of breaking rocks in the dungeon of Wizards of the Coast headquarters, and asks a question: "Kevin, my greatest student. He - he's all right, isn't he? You didn't hurt him?" Mark deals him a weighty blow with his boot. "Know your place, Richard. Get back to work."
I'm only opposed to it because it bears so little relation to how people actually play the game. The example of Miracles is actually a much better one then the Clone example I was trying to use.
From the game's perspective, the card can move instantly from face down in the library to revealed in the hand and that's fine for the rules. But in real life, we can't actually do that, so the card spends a good bit of time in locations that are neither where that player's library is nor where that player's hand is. And that's fine for real life. What I don't want is the disconnect to be explicitly codified. Along the lines of
183664.697 A game of Magic as laid out by these rules exists only as a pure Platonic ideal, utterly unrealizable by fallible mortals limited by the confines of physicality and the ravages of evil and sin.
183664.698 The cake is a lie, too.
I know it's true, but I don't want the rules to actually straight-up tell me that.
Pfft this cant be serious can it? If it is please delete your account OP. Its not even close to ban worthy, considering what JTMS and stoneforge had to accomplish to get banned i see the WotC selling magic to aquire Pokemon before that ever happens.
I'm trying to imagine sorin markov as a gym leader in one of those pokemon games which you have to beat him to get his badge... somehow I imagine that he would stab you in the chest with his sword before giving you the badge, even if you beat his pokemon....
Personally, I'd be fine with tea time but then I'm not gonna waste the mana summoning Emrakul, the Aeons Torn . He always takes all the sugar, drinks the whole pot of Earl Grey and doesn't even say thank you. SO. RUDE.
Break the Card is a regular thread in the Cards and Combo Forum. Quite simply, the participants are given a Johnnystatic card (e.g. Xenograft ) and are asked to build a deck around it. The winner and honorable mentions are sigged below. Get brewing!
This week's Break the Card was based around Xenograft . Thread : http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75842/27681049/Break_the_card_:_Xenograft?pg=1
Winner : Axterix with his Vampdrazi deck. Finalist : Vektor480 with his Ally/Golem/Plant deck. Honorable mentions : Zammm for the Turntimber Ranger combo and TinGorilla for suggesting Sarkhan the Mad .
Here's the link to the Mindlock Orb contest : http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75842/27697565/Break_the_Card_:_Mindlock_Orb?sdb=1&pg=last#497536269
Here's the link to Break the Card : Bludgeon Brawl : http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75842/27715169/Break_the_Card_:_Bludgeon_Brawl?sdb=1&pg=last#498208797
Winner : Vektor and his Grab the World deck. Finalist : Crandor with his Awesome Aliteration deck. Honorable mentions : RP Jesus with his Wat deck and Zix200 with his Signet Renewal deck.
This week was Followed Footsteps : http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75842/27748677/Break_the_Card_:_Followed_Footsteps?pg=1
Winner : Tevish_Szat with his Exponential Growth deck. Honorable mentions : Zix with his Carbon Copies deck and Escef with his Fungus of Speed and Time deck.
This week's card was Jace's Archivist : http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75842/28063377/Break_the_Card_:_Jaces_Archivist.
Finalists : Jentaru with his "Consecration of the Draw" deck and HereticSmitty with his "ADHD: The deck" deck. Winner : JaxsonBateman with his "The Archives Are Endless!" deck.
Long put short, Counters are broader answers than what other colors have because you can only cast them when your opponent casts the spell. Doom Blade is always relevant to draw. Cancel is not.
Doom Blade isn't relevant when you need to answer a sorcery like Bonfire, or keep a key planeswalker off the board. Useless when the opponent is using non-creature artifacts or enchantments. Cancel works against... all of those.
Cancel before Cavern was never a dead card in hand. Dissipate was never dead-in-hand.
Personally, I -do- think that Cavern is too far overboard. But I also think that counterspells are very powerful, and more uncounterable spells and creatures are a good thing. Cavern is too much of a good thing, but there needs to be available answers to countermagic, because countermagic is such a perfect answer to everything else.
everyone here seems to be generalizing their answers far too much, both from people i agree with and those i don't.
there is no such thing as a universal answer to anything. any given "answer" spell has an inherent drawback, weither it's doom blade drawn against a token card or a black creature, a wrath against a thragtusk, a counterspell when you were forced to tap out or something like a cancel against goblin guide.
counterspells are just a part of the game, a part of the color pie, a reasonable and often good answer to the powerful and expensive, but also require people to build decks a certain way and expect certain things to happen to make them work.
there's a give and take with everything. i know it's been said a million times before and will be said another million times after this. there are some many people that get hurt because you countered their spell and they get all bent out of shape because it doesn't feel good for someone to have an efficient answer.
ya know what? answers are supposed to be effecient in some manner, otherwise there would be virtually zero reason to play them. the game can't be all creatures. i think people don't realize how poor this game would actually be if counterspells didn't exist. i think what i've heard/seen is that this is so apparent when comparing legacy and modern. modern is a format with virtually no restrictions because of the answers available, and legacy is a really slow format because there are answers.
throw whatever backlash at that sentiment you want, but it really doesn't change how realistic it is
Blue is the best color ever. How do you deal?
Team GFG - "gulf, foxtrot, gulf" Twitter: Burning_Forest
there is no such thing as a universal answer to anything. any given "answer" spell has an inherent drawback, weither it's doom blade drawn against a token card or a black creature, a wrath against a thragtusk, a counterspell when you were forced to tap out or something like a cancel against goblin guide.
The problem with that statement is being forced to tap out isn't a drawback to counterspells specifically, its a drawback to every single instant spell in the game (ok except force of will, oh wait that's an interupt :P). And with all the U/B/x flash decks out there, tapping out isn't as much of an issue anymore. Furthermore, being tapped out isn't a drawback on the card, its a result of a poor decision made by the player, which we've all done.
The drawback they should have for counterspells IMO, is not to have a counterspell that counters everything... If they only have counters that "counter target creature spell" or "counter target instant or sorcery spell", then they'd have a real drawback, they'd be a lot more balanced, and we probly wouldn't need things like cavern of souls to restore balance to the format (or attempt to anyway :P).
Cancel before Cavern was never a dead card in hand. Dissipate was never dead-in-hand.
Absolutely strictly false.
Both were dead whenever you had to deal with what was on the board, when you needed to be pro-active or when you had to be able to deal with more than one card being played a turn and before turn 3 no matter what.
An entire set of category of deck's entire point in life is to make counters a dead card. Only having one left makes it half of a dead card. Needing to interact with the board now makes it a dead card.
Luckily, we have stop-having-fun guys to remind us that having anything more than 60 cards in your deck is tantamount to being a rapist and anyone considering it should be strung up by their **** .
Cancel before Cavern was never a dead card in hand. Dissipate was never dead-in-hand.
Absolutely strictly false.
Both were dead whenever you had to deal with what was on the board, when you needed to be pro-active or when you had to be able to deal with more than one card being played a turn and before turn 3 no matter what.
An entire set of category of deck's entire point in life is to make counters a dead card. Only having one left makes it half of a dead card. Needing to interact with the board now makes it a dead card.
Luckily, we have stop-having-fun guys to remind us that having anything more than 60 cards in your deck is tantamount to being a rapist and anyone considering it should be strung up by their **** .
: Regenerate.
