Cardboard rehab: TCG/CCG thread

[MatsuriSakuragi]

Cycling dual lands? Interesting.

[Tamer Anode/Cathode]

Cycling dual lands? Interesting.

I was about to get excited because I thought this and Groundskeeper basically worked as a green Azure Mage then I realized Groundskeeper only lets you recover basics. There's still a lot of utility for a land you can trade in for an additional draw when you've hit the top of your curve, though

[commandercool]

I mean, the old cycling lands saw tons of play. These are nearly strictly better than the Urza's ones and generally considerably better than the Onslaught ones, so taking popular and successful cards and straight-up improving them is probably a recipe for success (see Aether Hub, although Tendo Ice Bridge probably couldn't be considered as mainstream as the cycle lands).

[MatsuriSakuragi]

That fucking Gideon.

[commandercool]

Planeswalkers planeswalkers planeswalkers planeswalkers planeswalkers planeswalkers.

What do you guys think of Lay Bare The Heart? Is that anything? I know two-mana discard is much worse than one mana, but people sometimes play Castigate and this seems better than that. 

Trial Of Solidarity+Cartouche Of Solidarity seems surprisingly legit. Seems like you'd just need a few small enchantment synergies to grind a ton of value out of them. And grinding value can be extremely relevant for weenie strategies.

[Tamer Anode/Cathode]

That Gideon seems made around the expectation around the idea that BfZ was still rotating out so this is going to be kind of awkward

The Trial/Cartouche cycles look fairly fun, especially in Limited. The Cartouches in particular fix that problem of Auras not providing enough value to be worth playing.

UPDATE: Manglehorn is awesome, somebody give me a reason not to play monogreen in Standard

[commandercool]

Dang, much better Uktabi Orangutan is ace.

People were demanding better graveyard removal and there is some. Nothing Relic Of Progenitus or Bojuka Bog-level yet, but seems playable.

[MatsuriSakuragi]

should've just reprinted rest in peace in the shadows over innistrad block tbh

[commandercool]

Still possible as far as I know. I'm kind of inclined to think Rest In Peace is TOO brutal, but too much graveyard hate is better than not enough. Tormod's Crypt/Nihil Spellbomb are about the right level IMO.

[Tamer Anode/Cathode]

Quote from Design head Mark Rosewater that seems fairly interesting and relevant and gives a good hint to where they're taking things in the future:

When we started with the Gatewatch storyline, we began with the assumption that the Gatewatch, the core five, at least, should always be represented on planeswalker cards in Standard. (And remember Standard was 18 months at the time.) As we started to roll this plan out, we got feedback from many of you that this was problematic.

Yes, you wanted Gatewatch planeswalkers but we didn?t need to do them so often. You wanted the opportunity to see other favorites return or have new planeswalkers in some of those slots.

We heard you, but we work far ahead so there?s always a gap before you can see us react to feedback. Hours of Devastation was the first set that we could revamp how we did this. So starting with Hour, we?ve pulled back significantly on how often Gatewatch planeswalkers appear. They?ll appear when it?s important but at a much slower rate. We will use those slots instead to do more returning and new planeswalkers.

[commandercool]

I don't really care, it's still nonstop planeswalker spam. I guess different characters is marginally better, but this doesn't address my boredom with fucking planeswalkers so much.

Also WHAT A FUCKING MUMMY ANGEL? This set is the best.

[MatsuriSakuragi]

Definitely liking the mummy angel. It has a place in the commander deck I'd like to eventually build for sure.

Also, As Foretold is just stupid. I want it. But it's still stupid.

[commandercool]

So apparently people hate Aftermath, and I guess I kind of see why, but am I the only one who thinks Cut//Ribbons looks incredible in a control deck? Apparently I am, but that seems like a ton of value and neither side is THAT inefficient (although obviously neither is on curve).

[Tamer Anode/Cathode]

So apparently people hate Aftermath, and I guess I kind of see why, but am I the only one who thinks Cut//Ribbons looks incredible in a control deck? Apparently I am, but that seems like a ton of value and neither side is THAT inefficient (although obviously neither is on curve).

I think the issue people have with Aftermath is more "there's this cool art on the card and you're squishing it" I have pretty much the same evaluation of Cut//Ribbons that you do, it sounds like a good finisher for the Grixis deck they're inevitably going to push. On the other hand, Unlicensed Disintegration pretty much covers the same niche far more efficiently.

I am really excited for the monogreen stuff they're showing off; on one hand, Serpopard is an answer in search of a problem in the current meta, but Champion of Rhonas and Vizier of the Menagerie just scream "build around"

[commandercool]

The complaint I keep hearing about Aftermath (MTG Goldfish has a nice breakdown of the bad feelings people are having) is mostly that the cards are mostly just two below-curve common effects with only limited synergy stuck together, and that feels crappy in a rare spot, especially compared to commands or charms.

I do get that, Prepare//Fight is NOT going to be fun to open, but many of them seem at least solid. Especially in light of graveyard synergies and not necessarily just playing them normally.

[commandercool]

Dang, Rhonas seems like the best god by far. Too bad he can't grant Trample to himself to take advantage of that Deathtouch though.

[Tamer Anode/Cathode]

Dang, Rhonas seems like the best god by far. Too bad he can't grant Trample to himself to take advantage of that Deathtouch though.

Rhonas looks like it'll get a lot of mileage working alongside stuff like Lambholt Pacifist and Lupine Prototype in terms of "undercosted creatures which require you to meet a condition to use". I can actually see him being playable in Modern mono-green decks since you can pretty feasibly get a 4-power creature with stuff like Scavenging Ooze and Avatar of the Resolute

[MatsuriSakuragi]

...three planeswalkers now. Five, counting the bad ones from the precon decks.

This is reaching excess. On the other hand, with standard being as painfully stagnant as it is, maybe this will bring forth new archetypes.

[Tamer Anode/Cathode]

...three planeswalkers now. Five, counting the bad ones from the precon decks.

This is reaching excess. On the other hand, with standard being as painfully stagnant as it is, maybe this will bring forth new archetypes.

Five planeswalkers is typically the norm for a block, it just seems like we're getting more because the blocks are shorter now (although in the previous three-set block model we'd get five-ish walkers spread out throughout that block then around five in the following core set)

Harsh Mentor looks like it could be the shakeup to the meta we need; it does a lot against vehicles and Walking Ballista, that's for sure.

[commandercool]

Bontu seems like the worst god by far unless I'm overlooking something. Probably not unplayable, just fairly underwhelming. He would be infinitely more appealing, and probably not even too good, if his activation condition was "If a creature died under your control last turn" instead of "this turn" so he could at least reliably trigger off your opponent's removal.

Harsh Mentor seems like an all-time classic. That's a good-ass card right there,and it's going to genuinely shake up how all formats are played since it turns fetches into bolts and fetching untapped shocks into fucking Lava Axes

Speaking of all-time classics, it's not generically flavored enough to be reprinted in any block like the Mentor is, but does Glyph Keeper strike anyone else as one of the best control win conditions ever printed? It does so much, down to being castable off of an early-game Thought Scour targeting yourself.

[commandercool]

Ooh, maybe the best part of spoilers is here: The commons! Is there anything super crazy for Pauper?

-Blazing Volley seems like a very, VERY viable alternative to Electrickery. It's probably ultimately not quite as good since instant speed on Electrickery can net you card advantage pretty easily, but one mana is very relevant to snipe a Delver before it can try to flip when you're on the draw.

-Wander In Death is a much better version of Death's Duet, which is admittedly a bit of a fringe card already, but it's one I play and like. I'll definitely be slotting this in over Death's Duet in my deck.

-Trespasser's Curse seems like it has sideboard potential. It comes down early, completely shuts down infinite combos based on creatures, which is most of them in the format (including my Ivy Lane Denizen/Safehold Elite shenanigans), and seems seriously backbreaking against stuff like goblins and Kuldotha Rebirth in an aggressive matchup. Which admittedly is a bit narrow, and it arguably comes down a turn too late to catch a lot of explosive plays, but if it works it seems hard to recover from. Just not sure it's ever going to be better than more removal boarded in instead.

-Grasping Dunes might be something since there are a lot of high-priority one-toughness creatures that it can kill, although it's risky against Delver since it may flip before you can snipe it.

[Tamer Anode/Cathode]

Isn't Grasping Dunes an uncommon, though?

I like all the tools there are for monocolor decks in this set, monored and monogreen look very exciting to experiment with.

[MatsuriSakuragi]

the combo potential from amonkhet is just silly.

another one is sunscorched desert + ruin ghost + retreat to coralhelm + chromatic lantern-- it lets you flicker the land infinitely to kill your opponent, and you can make it a super safe combo in an aether vial/hatebear-y deck with selfless spirit and rattlechains and grand abolisher so you can just vial those dudes in and your opponent can't do anything about it on your turn

[commandercool]

I just realized that Festering Mummy isn't a functional Festering Goblin reprint, it's actually a strictly better Festering Goblin. Nice! I've always liked Festering Goblin and I would gladly play this over that because mummies are great, but the -1/-1 being permanent is a big deal.

[Tamer Anode/Cathode]

We've gotten a few announcements ahead of the scheduled official announcement day:

-Fall set will be officially called Ixalan and releases at the end of September
-Commander 2017 will be based around tribal decks rather than color sets, and will feature four decks instead of the usual five

[MatsuriSakuragi]

Please be faerie tribal please be faerie tribal please be faerie tribal

[commandercool]

Seems weird to do less than five decks since most tribes are tied to colors. That makes me think non-color-based tribes like slivers, elementals, allies, and maybe humans or spirits (Kamigawa redux without having to return to Kamigawa?) are most likely.

Actually. What if they go super cool and support fan-favorite tribes without much current support. Ninja, samurai, bear and ooze decks plz!

[Tamer Anode/Cathode]

The multicolor tribes I can see being easiest to support are Allies, Dragons, Slivers, and Elementals. We could also get something weird like artifact tribal with something like Scarecrows, who knows

[commandercool]

I had a pretty weird Amonkhet prerelease. Lots of bombs (Liliana and both rare sphinxes) but next to zero removal. Ended up playing a weird kind of bad Bant ramp deck, went 2-1. We should have had four rounds but it's gotten to the point where a significant number of players drop as soon as they lose a round at the store I play at, so in that sense we sort of got fucked. Sold the Liliana for about what I paid to enter, so whatevs.

[Tamer Anode/Cathode]

Did two prereleases this weekend. Went 1-3 on Saturday with a janky WB zombie deck where the best card was probably Plague Belcher. Sunday I went 2-2 with the RB discard aggro deck with remarkably strong commons/uncommons. Managed to pull a Daze invocation from my second prerelease pack, traded it to someone in exchange for some of their store credit and a few cards I can use in Commander, one of my prize packs had a Liliana in it so I'm happy.

Really looking forward to drafting this set at the end of this week, and seeing what bits of it can be put in constructed decks. Bloodrage Brawler has me REALLY interested in trying to build mono-red for Standard