Author Topic: Magic (Read 14155 times)

Cmdr_King · « **on:** December 24, 2007, 09:42:50 PM »

Honestly I just have some free time, but I know there's a few casual players around here, and hey, why not.

Anyway, to kick things off, just one of my decks, since I reference them often enough. This is, at its core, my oldest deck, one I was using before I fell out of the game originally. Naturally, it has since been intensely modified and isn't really the same deck, but it operates on the same general ideas.

4 Voice of All
4 Mine Bearer
3 Aurora Griffin
2 Crypt Angel
2 Reveille Squad
2 Serra Angel
2 Voice of Truth
2 Calciderm
Phyrexian Battleflies
Mageta the Lion
Avatar of Hope
Duskrider Peregrine
Desolation Angel
Mortivore
Serra Avenger

4 Disenchant
4 Seal of Doom
4 Terror
2 Damnation
Strength of Lunacy
Pentarch Ward
Dark Banishing
Vindicate
Soul Link

12 Plains
12 Swamps

Total: 71

So yeah, it's a little fat, and the weaknesses of not buying singles kinda shines through. The gist is really controlling combat. Lots of protection from color, and everything flying, coupled with plenty of creature kill to take out potential blockers adds up to being pretty hard to stop. The deck is naturally slow as all hell, so reset buttons abound. In general, it looks really clunky but oddly is probably my most successful overall deck for some reason.

So yeah! Everyone else talk! Now!

Yakumo · « **Reply #1 on:** December 24, 2007, 09:48:37 PM »

*hasn't played Magic this decade*

Sorry, man.

Carthrat · « **Reply #2 on:** December 25, 2007, 12:03:48 AM »

71 cards? That can't be good.

Out of curiosity, are you a Johnny, Timmy, or Spike?

Cmdr_King · « **Reply #3 on:** December 25, 2007, 12:07:06 AM »

I really tend to go KISS for deck design (despite what this one looks like >.>), which doesn't... really fit the usual Timmy/Johnny/Spike molds. Probably Timmy more than anything, but not very strongly so.

NotMiki · « **Reply #4 on:** December 25, 2007, 02:10:28 AM »

I'll post my deck when I'm back home and have time, which is to say early '08. It'll make you numbers-obsessed types cringe, clocking in at a shockingly obese 150~180 cards, and works just to spite you. Red deck with burn, good deal of mana producers, mid-sized creatures, more than its fair share of reset buttons, and a number of handy blanket effects. Also, Orcish Librarians.

Plus side: if you're playing casually and someone needs a deck, half of mine will do in a pinch.

Xeroma · « **Reply #5 on:** December 25, 2007, 02:57:26 AM »

I lost my old deck and have been slowly trying to recover via Lorwyn, with... mixed results. Need help making a good goblin deck mostly, and by "help", I mean "monies".

Captain K. · « **Reply #6 on:** December 25, 2007, 04:34:25 AM »

The Canadians have taken my cards. Blame Canada!

Hunter Sopko · « **Reply #7 on:** December 25, 2007, 04:48:38 AM »

::Mumbles something about Magic and lays a rose on the grave of Dreamblade::

At least our best player (Sam Black) walked in and completely wrecked the Magic World Championships in NYC.

Unoriginal · « **Reply #8 on:** December 25, 2007, 07:35:58 PM »

Stopped playing several years ago, when the group I was with eventually split up. I pretty much used the same Red/Green deck throughout, making adjustments to it as certain deck trends came about, as well as when I picked up the occasional upgrade. The last adjustment was made a little after Kamigawa came out, and Miroden was still going on strong, so you'll see a decent amount of artifact removal kicking around.

It's a mess, but it did fairly well for itself, particularly in FFAs. Not bad for a deck that originally got it's start when a friend handed me a big box of commons and told me to knock myself out.

4 Metallic Sliver
4 Muscle Sliver
2 Heart Sliver
4 Spined Sliver
2 Hunter Sliver
2 Magma Sliver
4 Llanowar Elves
4 Spikeshot Goblin
2 Viashino Heretic
1 Mirri, Cat Warrior
4 Rancor
2 Bravado
4 Lightning Bolt
1 Shatterstorm
1 Soul Foundry
1 Loxodon Warhammer
1 Slate of Ancestry
9 Mountain
9 Forest

Sideboard/Stuff to screw around with
1 Shivan Dragon
1 Shatterstorm
1 Mercadian Atlas
1 Destructive Urge

AndrewRogue · « **Reply #9 on:** December 26, 2007, 08:56:13 PM »

When I'm bored, I think I'll flex my muscle a bit and try to clean up some decks posted here to get back what little talent I originally had. In the meanwhile though, let's post some of my own Apprentice based stupidity!

Dementia

12x Swamp
7x Plains

4x Alter of Dementia
4x Coldsteel Heart
4x Chromatic Sphere
1x Lotus Petal

4x Priest of Gix

4x Dark Ritual
4x Enduring Renewal
4x Diabolic Tutor
3x Damnation
3x Enlightened Tutor
3x Raise Dead
1x Necroportence
1x Demonic Tutor
1x Vampiric Tutor

Stupid deck designed to blitz out an infinite combo (I really need some better control in it >_>). Anyhow, it plays off the old Enduring Renewal engine and, since Ornithopter can't be used here because of the Alter requiring power to mill with, it instead uses the essentially free Priest of Gix. Everything else in the deck is designed to accelerate the engine either by getting the mana or getting the cards. Normally, I can death mill at turn 4. Whee.

Eternity

8x Mountain
8x Plain
4x Sacred Foundry

4x Isochron Scepter

4x Enlightened Tutor
4x Browbeat
4x Angel's Grace
4x Final Fortune
4x Rally the Righteous

4x Sunhome Enforcer
4x Skyknight Legionnaire
4x Boros Recruit
4x Boros Guildmage

More cute stupidity. R/W beatdown with a twist! While slowly wearing my opponent down, I also set up two scepters keyed to Final Fortune and Angel's Grace, allowing me infinite turns. Beautiful, but still suffers from trouble drawing the requisite cards.

Sierra · « **Reply #10 on:** December 26, 2007, 09:54:31 PM »

Eh. Sure, why not. Do note that I haven't played the game in years and it's been longer since I actually bought cards. So you'll see a total lack of anything more recent than the Urza's sets and a lot of obscure old stuff here. I also tended to just throw in whatever I thought was cool as opposed to building a deck around some actual theme or strategy. This will be abundantly clear when you look at my white deck, but blue first since that's the color I started with (one of the Dopplegangers is actually from my first starter pack).

Creatures

Palinchron
4x Mahamoti Djinn
2x Vesuvan Doppleganger
Air Elemental
Water Elemental
3x Clone
Serendib Efreet
Temporal Adept
Apprentice Wizard
Ertai, Wizard Adept
Magus of the Unseen

Enchantments/Instants/Sorceries

Amnesia
Recantation
Psychic Allergy
4x Control Magic
Braingeyser
Transmute Artifact
Counterspell
Copy Artifact
Hurkyl's Recall
Recall
Siren's Call
Flood
Drafna's Restoration

Artifacts

Stone Calendar
Nevinyrral's Disk
Skull of Orm
Sol Ring
Necropolis
Juggernaut
Dragon Engine

Land

2x Svyelunite Temple
18x Island

60 cards (1/3 land, 1/3 creatures, 1/3 everything else)

What's this, a blue player with only one Counterspell? Yeah, this is not at all an efficient deck (I did say that I operated according to Rule of Cool, didn't I?) If I get shafted on land early on, I pretty much just die. Sure, there's some stuff to alleviate high mana costs (Sol Ring, how I love you), but the bottom line is that it's a creature-based deck with a noted lack of cheap cannon-fodder, and therefore it takes a long time to get going. Still, there are a couple fun (if unwiedly and expensive) combos. Psychic Allergy breaks any stalemate (name a color when casting this enchantment; opponent takes one damage during their upkeep for every permanent of that color under their control); Flood + Siren's Call kills off a whole army if I have the mana for it (any flying enemies just run into the Mahamoti Brigade); and hey, if there's really nothing better to do with my turn, there's always Braingeyser + Amnesia.

It's notably weak against fast damage decks and mook brigades (that Control Magic/Skull of Orm cheese is much less effective when there are no notable heavy hitters to steal from your opponent). It's built for long, drawn-out wars with similar decks and games I win usually end with a horrible stampede.

The Serendib Efreet is just there for laughs, yes (it's the blue card that got printed with a green border/background and the wrong art).

Onwards with the white deck, which makes even less sense given the usual strengths of its color.

Creatures

Elder Land Wurm
Seraph
Personal Incarnation
Hand of Justice
Petra Sphinx
4x Serra Angel
Veteran Bodyguard
4x Witch Hunter
Ekundu Griffon
Preacher
2x White Knight
Order of the White Shield
Order of Leitbur
Mesa Falcon

Enchantments/Instants/Sorceries

Serra's Liturgy
Wrath of God
Resurrection
Kismet
Reverse Damage
Blessing
Crusade
Eye for an Eye
Prismatic Ward
3x Disenchant
2x Divine Offering
2x Swords to Plowshares
Righteousness

Artifacts

Meekstone
Sol Ring
Nevinyrral's Disk
Juggernaut

Land

2x Ruins of Troikar
19x Plains

63 cards (1/3 land, 1/3 creatures, 1/3 everything else)

Yup, there are a few cheap weenies in there to boost up with Crusade, but those 6/7-mana creatures really bog things down. And there's even less combo potential here than in my blue deck. More tomfoolery with burning artifacts, at least (my usual opponent was my brother, whose black deck included four Icy Manipulators and multiple Millstones. God, he was irritating). But usually I just had to try winning a straight slugfest; anyone who could circumvent needing creatures at all was likely to win.

Taishyr · « **Reply #11 on:** December 29, 2007, 10:25:33 AM »

Been playing a Magic: The Gathering adaptation called Shandalar. It was really cool, still is, and has a lot of interesting stuff involved in it. Catch? It's all mostly 4th Edition or before.

Still, it's an effective little thing and was quite fun to fiddle around in. I'll have to post my deck that I killed the 200 HP Black Lotus cheese final with; it was amusing, but not always efficient. (91 cards. Needed since multiple opponents are capable of quick mills + you often get into multiple ante fights in a row without a chance to swap new cards in + you can only have 4 of a card if you have 80 or more cards in the deck.)

Grefter · « **Reply #12 on:** December 29, 2007, 03:00:00 PM »

There are some that would argue that the mostly being fourth makes that game better >_> Did it have the expansion or not Tai (Has a few other prior to fourth sets with it and a few cards created specifically for the game? I found the expansion does improve the game a fair bit both in the Shandalar mode and by giving really easy access to simulated proper games. Sealed Deck tournaments without having to spend a couple of hundred dollars on cards is a lot of fun. You even can manually open up and check through the packets like you do in real life (or just skip the bullshit). It is a lot of fun.

metroid composite · « **Reply #13 on:** December 30, 2007, 12:05:13 AM »

Quote from: Captain K. on December 25, 2007, 04:34:25 AM

The Canadians have taken my cards. Blame Canada!

It's just common fighting game logic: the two sissiest and/or annoying people are going to be top-tier! I mean, there's Elfboy and I, who are effeminate Canadians, and wasn't Meeple third?

On Magic, I haven't been messing around too much with deck-building. I have some vague interest in building around Cairn Wanderer, but I feel such a deck would need to be standard-legal (since 5 mana creature not so viable in faster formats) but also that such a deck really, really needs Giant Solifuge, which just rotated out of standard. Not that there aren't other creatures that work fairly well, but nothing that's really great on its own whose presence in the graveyard alone would justify the Cairn Wanderer (unlike Solifuge).

Otherwise, mostly been watching the metagame. I'm amused that poison now seems to be viable. Not only that but viable in Vintage (Type 1). I guess Virulent Sliver is kinda just that good (if you're looking at it and scratching your head, here's why it's good: when there's two Virulent Slivers in play, they each have "poisionous 1" and "poisonous 1", which means they each give two poison counters when they deal damage. So...attacking with four Virulent Slivers, for instance, gives 16 poison counters--instant win). The thing that surprised me even more, though, was Stingscourger being used in a first-place deck in a major Vintage tournament; it's kinda a sucky man-o'-war (though it's red, which I guess helped).

Standard's metagame seems a bit ho hum right now. It seems to be a mix between remnants of Time Spiral decks (Dragonstorm, and decks that abuse comes into play abilities). Plus decks that decide "green is good right now", which tends to mean green/black since the most important green Lorwyn tribes are green/black (Elves and Treefolk). Sure, it wouldn't be fair at all to call all the green/black decks the same deck (since they're fairly different) but they tend to have a lot of the same support spells (same creature kill, same discard, sometimes the same mana generators). Though to be perfectly fair there's also green/red big mana, green/blue fairies, and monogreen with Nightmare Clone #786.

Taishyr · « **Reply #14 on:** December 30, 2007, 02:03:47 PM »

I'd like to take this moment to say: the card names have gotten immensely silly to me.

Grefter: Yeah, this version looks to have all the expansions for around that time. Fairly neat all in all and I'm not going to argue that it benefits in some regards from not having the other cards.

...

...Gah, now I want to see versions of this game with all the expansions so you can pick and choose, and give the opponents standards for how each should design their decks (not too hard, I'd think, but perhaps so). Man, why can't WotC figure out a way to do this?

Grefter · « **Reply #15 on:** December 30, 2007, 05:30:13 PM »

Fourth edition and its previous sets with Fourth Ed. rules is a very well balanced self contained entity. It is pretty much around the point where I consider it reached the most fun balance between power and longevity in a game. Ice Age didn't really raise the stakes in an obvious manner (it did with some specific areas). Mirage was a a bit power inflated. Visions and Weatherlight followed around the same level as Mirage and then you get the Rath cycle which was balls out uber for the time. Power just inflates from there.

Keeping stuff around the same power level is pretty important to the value of Magic (see Standard and the way it only uses the latest 3 sets, it has a balancing use outside of the obvious cash cow benefits).

Edit - That is by restricting it to fourth you have a standardised environment, technically any set could be used, but Fourth and it's prior sets were well known at the time if not cutting edge releases. Also Sealed Deck in it is nice in that you can even restrict it to Alpha/Beta/Limited if you like.

Wizards did find a way to incorporate lots of expansions and selectable rules and whatnot and make it better money for them Tai with the Magic Online thing or whatever it is called where you have to buy cards to play.

Ultradude · « **Reply #16 on:** December 30, 2007, 09:59:59 PM »

I'll post my deck when I get home Tues. night. Currently play on a semi-regular basis, so my deck is in a pretty formative stage. Blue deck that I can't identify as a specific type, other than having lots of ninjas and some Infiltrator's Mage Marks and stuff. Some counters, some bouncing, a few enchantments. Noobs can't keep themselves from getting poked to death by 1/1 and 2/2 ninjas, and does sorta okay against the better players.

NotMiki · « **Reply #17 on:** January 02, 2008, 04:16:05 AM »

Ok here goes. Posting the one deck I have that could be considered efficient. Discard deck, very much type 1. Hell, if there's a type more liberal than 1, it's probably that.

62 cards

Sorceries/Instants:
Dark Ritual x 4
Funeral Charm x 4
Hymn to Tourach x 4
Misinformation x 2
Diabolic Edict x 2
Icequake x 3
Ill-Gotten Gains x 1
Ashes to Ashes x 1
Vampiric Tutor x 1
Skeletal Scrying x 1

Enchantments:
Megrim x 4
Phyrixean Arena x 1
Desolation x 1

Artifacts:
The Rack x 4
Geth's Grimoire x 2
Liar's Pendulum x 1
Memory Jar x 1

Creatures:
Hypnotic Specter x 4
Headhunter x 2
Cabal Interrogator x 1

Land:
Swamp x 14
Sheltered Valley x 2
Barren Moor x 1
Polluted Mine x 1

Basic idea: Put up Megrims and Racks, to hit them when they discard and when they have small hands, egt the discarding done with creatures and spells, and seal the deal with land destruction and Misinformation (which takes up to 3 of your opponent's cards from their graveyard and puts them on top of their library). Also, Memory Jar, for massive discarding. Only 4 cards in the deck cost more than 3, and running out of things to cast is an issue, so fewer than the typical 1/3 mana. Tends to be very good against slow decks and decks that rely on esoteric combos but aren't particularly effective without them. Has issues with green decks and the type that get creatures out quick. Not as consistent a winner as I would like, but not easy to consistently beat, either.

NotMiki · « **Reply #18 on:** January 02, 2008, 04:54:17 AM »

My other black deck, built under my usual reasoning that if you maintain the right consistency, your deck can be any size you want. I've slimmed it down to 60 before, but there are too many fun black cards to play with or me to keep the pounds off.

Cards: 130

Instants/Sorceries:
Dark Ritual x 4
Drain Life x 4
Contagion x 4
Terror x 1
Simulacrum x 1
Kaervek's Spite x 1
Corrupt x 1
Extinction x 1
Mind Twist x 1
Demonic Tutor x 1
Death Cloud x 1
Doomsday x 1
Infernal Contract x 1
Decree of Pain x 1

Enchantments:
Animate Dead x 3
Necromancy x 3
Pestilence x 4
Infernal Darkness x 1
No Mercy x 1
Engineered Plague x 1
Sadistic Glee x 1
Soul Kiss x 1

Artifacts:
Whispersilk Cloak x 1
Lotus Blossom x 1
Nevinyrral's Disk x 1
Sol Ring x 1

Creatures:
Vampire Bats x 1
Will-o-the-Wisp x 1
Leaden Myr x 3
Fog of Gnats x 2
Soldevi Adnate x 2
Skittering Skirge x 2
Black Knight x 1
Crypt Rats x 4
Coffin Queen x 2
Diseased Vermin x 1
Sorceress Queen x 1
Royal Assassin x 1
Maddening Imp x 1
Spike Cannibal x 1
Lurking Evil x 1
Chimeric Idol x 1
Nightshade Seer x 1
Dancing Scimitar x 1
Cabal Interrogator x 1
Mortivore x 1
Sengir Vampire x 2
Soul Collector x 2
Repentant Vampire x 1
Pit Spawn x 1
Scion of Darkness x 1
Avatar of Woe x 1
Spirit of the Night x 1

Land:
Swamp x 41

Basic Idea: beat up the other guy with creatures, control the game with Pestilence and Plague Rats, finish the deal with Drain Life. Bit bigger than I remember leaving it (I modify my decks all the time when I'm playing, which I haven't for about 2 years).

I don't have one in my deck right now, but I've been surprised over the years by the psychological effectiveness of Necrite, which is a 2/2 for 3 mana, can be sacrificed after being unblocked to bury target creature. Not a great creature, but the visible threat to kill anything makes people nervous about attacking, which is of course silly when you're playing against a black deck, since chances are that creature you're worried about is gonna get killed one way or the other. Anyway.

Grefter · « **Reply #19 on:** January 02, 2008, 07:10:55 AM »

Ahhhh I figure since I have been talking about the Micropose release of this I will put up my favoured deck to use in that when I am playing with custom decks.

Mono black. Pretty textbook at the end of the day. Not really a great deck for playing against humans most likely, but it handles the vast majority of computer opponents. (My current install of magic has 149 wins, 37 losses and 1 draw. 79% victory ratio, most of that will be with this deck) It doesn't really exploit the computer AI all that much other than just playing with the enemy. It is also oversized since there is cards in there that I like to play with but are not required. Forced to I could probably trim it down from it's 73 cards to a legal 60.

Swamp x 17 (In a 60 card deck could easilly trim this to 14, or less with the artifacts taken into account)

Black Knight x4
Hypnotic Specter x2
Nightmare x2 (one of the cards I would drop, not a game winner)
Royal Assassin x4 (Could probably drop it to 3 if needed)
Sengir Vampire x4
Sorceress Queen x4 (Also could easilly cut down to 2 or 3)
Bad Moon x4
Necropolis of Azar x2 (Unique to the game's expansion pack, will post stats in a second)
Demonic Tutor x4 (Well if you can get 4 of them what black deck WON'T take them >_>)
Drain Life x2 (Would keep them while cutting back. Not a key part of the deck but pulls you out of a tight spot)
Dark Ritual x4 (First turn Sengir/Royal/Sorceress Queen/Hyppie is sex)
Howl From Beyond x2 (Mostly in there for shits and giggles, swapping for 2 terror would be a more solid move)

Forcefield x2 (This card is silly)
Mox Jet x4 (See Demonic Tutor)
Sol Ring x2 (As above)
Icy Manipulator (A classic and sooooo freaking good)
Living Wall x4 (2 words. White Knight.)

Edit - Right the Necropolis' stats that I forgot to post.

BB2
Whenever a non-black creature is put into any graveyard from play, put a husk counter on Necropolis of Azar.

5, Remove a Husk counter from Necropolis of Azar: Put a Spawn of Azar token into play. Treat this token as a black creature with random Power and Toughness no less than 1 and no greater than 3, that has Swampwalk.

It is another card the deck does not need and is just in there for shits and giggles to see how far into the negatives you can send the enemy before they draw their last card. Get them both into play before you start assassinating their shit and it gets silly. PCs from the time the game was released to not handle this well.

NotMiki · « **Reply #20 on:** January 02, 2008, 11:11:32 PM »

I dunno about the Demonic Tutor thing. I mean, yes, they're great in most situations, but when you're going for speed on low mana, and have a fairly homogeneous deck, you...probably only want...two of them? Yeah, not getting far with this argument. For your deck, I would advocate a pestilence or two (I assume they're legal by this set of rules), especially given your bad moons and lack of terror. And this is pure personal preference, but I'd sub in 2 Flying Scimitars for your Living Walls. Just as good for the White Knights, and a good combo with Howl from Beyond.

Grefter · « **Reply #21 on:** January 03, 2008, 12:46:53 AM »

I like the Regenerate that much and there isn't anything you really need a 1/5 flyer to block in the sets. The green decks also are overrepresented by decks involving Basilisks and Cockatrice. Also Howl is one of the cards I have really thought about dropping for a couple of Terrors.

Demonic Tutor is worth the four cards I find (especially with the deck oversized), it can really save your arse with getting a Living Wall before a White Knight or Whirling Dervish goes to town on you (the main Protection from Black things you need to worry about in the game). Having 8 cards in your deck to save you is much much more important than having 4/6. It bring the odds of getting one if you haven't already got it up above the average number of turns for the Knight to kill you. It still doesn't work all the time but increasing the odds is pretty important to me (Honestly a decent portion of those 37 losses would be to the damned things).

Pestilence would fit in really well and pairs up with the Necropolis insanely well. I just fucking hate the things, both the mechanic of them shits me and I have played enough Shandalar to develop a deep rage whenever someone uses it, same with Nevinryal's Disc or whatever it is called. Fucking low level black shits.

NotMiki · « **Reply #22 on:** January 04, 2008, 12:17:45 AM »

Inspired by this crazy 'effectiveness' idea, I'm gonna revise my black deck, probably down to my preferred 90 cards. 60 is possible, but getting it that low pushes out all the fun cards that inspire me to play in the first place. I'll post the results of my deck liposuction when I'm done with it.

Thinking back on Mirage and Visions, I don't seem much of an increase in power, especially compared to Alliances (which I've always regarded well. Ever since it came out, I've been killing first turn Sengirs with same-turn Pyrokinesis). Weatherlight kicked it up a notch, though. Hidden Horror is the card that leaps to mind. Wish I had a few of those myself.

Grefter · « **Reply #23 on:** January 04, 2008, 12:36:26 AM »

Yeah the ramp up from Ice Age onwards is there, but it is an acceptable one. Even Weatherlight isn't so bad, but the whole Rath Cycle is just head and shoulders over the old stuff.

NotMiki · « **Reply #24 on:** January 04, 2008, 01:25:08 AM »

Yeah, that's about right. I've always considered Allainces through Weatherlight to be the best Magic had to offer, especially artistically: big budget, but previous to the artistic fascism of storylines. In terms of power, though, those sets are more balanced but I'm not convinced they're more powerful than the best of what Legends and sets around it had to offer. I guess what they had to set them apart was consistency.

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Author Topic: Magic (Read 14155 times)

Taishyr

Taishyr