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By: Kumagoro42, Gianluca Aicardi
Aug 24 2012 10:20am
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 Welcome back to Tribal Apocalypse, in the week where Tribal Achievements really started to achieve some momentum. Five of them were unlocked. Let's see how.

  • Event Number: 33 (2012), 85 (all-time)
  • Date: August 18
  • Attendance: 18
  • Rounds: 3
  • Special Rules: none
  • Top 4: Chamale (Human, undefeated); Ranth (Wizard, undefeated); AJ_Impy (Angel, 1 loss); RexDart (Spirit, 1 loss)
  • Special Prizes: Endangered Prize to vantar6697 (Dryad); Topical Prize to AJ_Impy (Angel)
  • Tribes: Ally, Angel, Assassin, Beast, Construct, Dryad, Eldrazi, Elf, Fungus, Goblin, Human (x2), Merfolk (x2), Spirit, Vampire, Vedalken, Wizard
  • Virgin Tribe: Dryad by vantar6697
  • Event link (with all players, pairings, standings, decks, and results): here it is

 It all happened thanks to a lone stranger (well, sort of: it was his second event after last week) who came to town seriously determined to plunder and pillage. His name is Chamale, and he was riding this Human deck.

 

 That, ladies and gentlemen, is the first deck we saw that was expressly designed to unlock achievements. In particular, it aimed at the following four (which in fact, it successfully unlocked during the 3 rounds of the event):

  • Deserted — Winning a game with Barren Glory (2 tix)
  • Second Chance — Winning a game with Near-Death Experience (2 tix)
  • Community — Having 10 different tribal members on the battlefield at the same time (3 tix)
  • Miracles Happen — Winning a game while there are no permanents in play (3 tix)

 The last one, courtesy of Worldfire, that also kindly enables the first two. The whole 10-tix package, courtesy of the powerful Dream Halls/Conflux engine. Take some time to peek the different Humans he used, though. There's nice and clever stuff in there. Chamale has come to stay. His name means business. Be afraid of him. Be very afraid.

 And be afraid of good ol' Ranth, too, because he's still the fast and furious king of the hill. These Wizards cover all the bases and can kick even combo where it hurts, thanks to a healthy dose of counter magic, up to that sly, singleton Stifle.

 

 And finally, AJ_Impy took his Angels to the Topical Prize. Thanks to it being reworked into rewarding the Topical Tribes (currently: Angel or Demon) that place higher ending with at least one match win, rather than outright undefeated. But this deck was very close to end undefeated anyway, and it's a wonderful gathering of some of the strongest Angels under 8 CMC, encompassing all five colors, which is truly amazing in itself.


 What can I say? Jenara, Sigarda, and Gisela are among the best Angels ever printed; with Baneslayer you can never be wrong; and Tariel, Reckoner of Souls is a nice surprise, rarely seen, but very powerful herself. I might have just used another 4 CMC tribesman over Indomitable Archangel, though (Guardian Seraph or Emeria Angel for their tactical value, and at least one copy of Linvala, Keeper of Silence), but I understand the solidity of a 4/4 flyer for 4 mana, plus the off-chance of achieving a soft-lock with Platinum Angel and a couple Coalition Relics. Also interesting it's the use of Cavern of Souls to fix the complex mana demand, while at the same time sheltering the Angels from those decks that feature a significant amount of disruption, like Ranth's (too bad the two didn't meet, it would have been an interesting matchup).

 And to round off the Top 4, RexDart has done a deck tech audio-commented video of his build again (he's really into these kinds of things, and I really thank him for that! More, more!). Like you'll hear, it was a Spirit deck built around these cards (plus the damage-preventing Spirits of the phantom variety, namely Phantom Tiger, Phantom Nantuko, and Phantom Centaur):

   

 The deck ended 4th place with 1 loss. Let's hear all its secrets being revealed by its maker:

 And here's a game he played against me, while I was running a Construct deck with Goblin Welder that had very bad matchups (I won this particular game, but not the match). Rex talks a bit about the Goblin Welder family of decks too, since it's something he likes as much as me. 

 Last decklist of the day: the latest Virgin Tribe, which also got the Endangered Prize, which also unlocked the "include a singleton copy of every tribal member and no other creatures" achievement (while also being a singleton deck all the way), and which also ended 6th place with a 2-1 score. Good job to vantar6697, and good job to the cute, surprising, underrated Dryads.

 

 So let's graciously bow before the Dryads. All 21 of them.

 And now, before going to our regularly scheduled Announcements, a new section that I was planning to do since a while.


THE HIGH PRICE OF WINNING

 Also known as: how much do the Top 4 decks cost? As of August 24, 2012, here's the answers (MTGO Traders prices; the cheaper version of each card is always used; basic lands count zero):

  • 1st place, Chamale's Humans: $37.78 (without the lands: $19.34)
  • 2nd place, Ranth's Wizards: $290.76 (without the lands: $77.57)
  • 3rd place, AJ_Impy's Angels: $261.20 (without the lands: $95.14)
  • 4th place, RexDart's Spirits: $222.81 (without the lands: $37.96)

ANNOUNCEMENT TIME!

 Just to remind you of:

 The Watch List: some particular, archetype-defining cards have been put in a specific Watch List, giving them Annoyance Levels based on how frequently they show up and their degree of success. Once a card gets to Level 3 or more, I'll recommend it to Blippy for banning until the following year. So far, with 9 cards on watch, the situation is as follows:

 The Tribal Achievements: Clan Leys, which is now in charge of any Special Prize, has launched and is handling the Tribal Achievements too: a way to have fun within Tribal Apocalypse, challenge yourself to do all kinds of strange MTG feats, and make some tix in the process. You can find the complete list of achievements here on the Hall of Fame. 9 unlocked, 41 to go. Remember to call in a witness from Clan Leys (me, SBena, or Leys7) before moving on when an In-Game or Endgame achievement is involved, or we'll have to resort to replays and such.

 The Virgin Prize is ending its first run: only 6 tribes are still standing (Unicorn, Monger, Harpy, Homarid, Mongoose, and Squid). Hurry up and make these dorks go away, so we can start over with the Almost Virgin Prize.

 The Hamtastic Award: after its first edition ended with Leys7 taking the 5 tix for running 10 different tribes in a row, the Biodiversity Prize dedicated to the memory of Erik Friborg has started again. Currently we have Gq1rf7 and slug360 leading the group, with 4 tribes played so far.

 The Kirin Challenge is still unclaimed: I'll give 1 tix out of my pocket to the first player who'll win a proper match (no bye, no opponent forfaiting) with a Kirin deck featuring 4 copies of each of them. Clear this and we'll pass to Nephilim.

 Videos: Send me replays of your games, please! It's unbelievably easy: just download a free software like CamStudio and upload the resulting video file on YouTube, or send it to me via WeTransfer (my address is aicardigianluca at gmail.com); I'll embed it here. IMPORTANT NOTE: use a MPEG-4 codec or other codecs able to compress the videos (you can choose which one to use in Options/Video Options of CamStudio, but you have to have the codec installed in your system; you can find a MPEG-4 codec installer for free just by Googling it, I suggest the open-source Xvid project), or you'll end up with gigantic files you can't upload on YouTube and spend hours to send me. An average game replay is around 20-30 MB. If yours is 500 MB or even 2 GB, something is clearly wrong.

 And that's all, once again. See you on the Tribal room!

12 Comments

Keep forgetting to talk about by Kumagoro42 at Fri, 08/24/2012 - 15:10
Kumagoro42's picture

Keep forgetting to talk about Ranth's channel that broadcasts his games during Tribal Apocalypse (unfortunately, I can't embed the replays of those): http://www.twitch.tv/wicked_intent

I'm slightly surprised at the by AJ_Impy at Fri, 08/24/2012 - 18:46
AJ_Impy's picture

I'm slightly surprised at the deck cost, although most of that is slow investment in staples over time, and getting in with the legendary AVR angels at the ground floor. Admittedly that deck had a deliberately all-mythic creature base, but I dare say this Saturday's deck will be somewhat cheaper.

Ya I'll admit the deck prices by Ranth at Fri, 08/24/2012 - 19:00
Ranth's picture

Ya I'll admit the deck prices had thrown me for a loop as well. I guess our manabases have grown quite a bit over time eh? ( I remember picking up alot of the lands for 5-15 each,most closer to 5 then 15)

I didn't comment on them, but by Kumagoro42 at Sat, 08/25/2012 - 12:22
Kumagoro42's picture

I didn't comment on them, but I'm with Rex: they're not that high, considering it's Legacy. It's almost all lands, and you can convert those decks with cheaper lands if you want (of course, in some cases the decks would become way less effective that way).

And yes, like Ranth said below, please don't make any assumption about a player's wealth based on the price of their decks, or something silly like that. Some of those cards were really cheap back in the time, while some other cards that were worth a fortune are now affordable. The prices are in constant flux on MTGO.

Bottom line is: buy lands when you can. I know it's boring, but your decks (all of them) will be better. Especially the fetch lands, as most of the old ones are relatively cheap these days.

I did not stream last week by Ranth at Fri, 08/24/2012 - 18:40
Ranth's picture

I did not stream last week because i wasn't feeling well in combination with the world cup pro tour being streamed.
I WANT to stream this weekend however am currently still not feeling well and may have to go to the hospital if I cannot get whatever is going on under control.

Hope you get better soon, by AJ_Impy at Fri, 08/24/2012 - 18:43
AJ_Impy's picture

Hope you get better soon, man.

Be well and do not hesitate by Paul Leicht at Fri, 08/24/2012 - 22:57
Paul Leicht's picture

Be well and do not hesitate to go if your condition worsens.

I am not surprised how cheap by RexDart at Fri, 08/24/2012 - 19:48
RexDart's picture

I am not surprised how cheap the top decks were, minus land. (And I mean cheap relative to legacy.) When you think about it, alot of the expensive legacy staples aren't that hot in tribal, and alot of the cards that would make certain popular tribal decks expensive are banned. Other than my esper spirit deck with the Vindicates and Geists, I'd wager most everything I've played has been under $50 not counting lands. Unless your tribe has a must-include mythic rare thats in Standard, like werewolves with Huntmaster, your creature base isn't going to be that expensive. And most of the best support cards are cheap, and you can buy them over time and use them in many lists. The staples of this format are StP, Bolt, and Brainstorm, judging from the card popularity chart.

IMO, a great way to get into this format is to buy the common/uncommon staples, then invest in one "engine" or archetype that you could use in multiple decks, like Entombs for reanimator, or Ancient Tomb and City of Traitors for Dragons and other big tribes. I think that's about what most of us do, we gradually acquire some archetype staples and find ourselves building decks around them. One of the things I love about this PRE is that as you grow your collection you can use it as a place to experiment an have fun with some of your new purchases. But you can just as easy play without resorting to ANY of those archetypes, and just play the best guys in your tribe, with some removal and other ways to interact, and give it a go.

Videos from this week by Chamale at Fri, 08/24/2012 - 21:47
Chamale's picture

Great article, Kumagoro! I've got some tech for tomorrow's event, and I'll be aiming for 4 new achievements. Here are some Youtube videos from this event, in case anyone would like to see my deck operate:

In the first match, I played against Romellos's Merfolk and played most of my deck, earning the Community and Miracles Happen achievements. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmQpF-Dinvo

In my third match, AJ_Impy's Angels managed to disrupt some of my combo, forcing me to improvise a new win condition. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-YcBDEL4NHA

Good job, Chamale. Too bad I by Kumagoro42 at Sat, 08/25/2012 - 12:16
Kumagoro42's picture

Good job, Chamale. Too bad I didn't get these links in time to embed them! I can do it next time (maybe with new videos? Keep up with the good work!)

As a somehow related story, I don't know if it varies from user to user, but my experience with the client's offline message system is that they don't have word wrap, so you can't read anything after 30 characters or so. So it's better NOT to send me important, long messages there. My email is in the article anyway (at the end, in the videos section).

Chamales deck looks like a by grapplingfarang at Sat, 08/25/2012 - 02:52
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5

Chamales deck looks like a lot of fun. Good article as always, interesting to see the twists in tribal over the summer.

Hey, grappling! You'll be by Kumagoro42 at Sat, 08/25/2012 - 12:17
Kumagoro42's picture

Hey, grappling! You'll be back soon? :)