Welcome back to Tribal Apocalypse!
Table of Contents
- Last Week on Tribal Apocalypse...
- The High Price of Winning
- Announcement Time!
- What's Next
Check the full archive for the "Diaries of the Apocalypse" series
THOUGHTS OF A TRIBAL HOST
by Kumagoro
Summer is coming, and Amonkhet is trending hard, but it didn't see much play in Tribal Apocalypse yet. How so? Time to try your hands at the Bolas Prize! Or what about winning a match with that Camel deck you're secretly building? It'd be three tix for you if you do, according to New Kids of the Block Award rules. Don't let AJ steal those tix from you!
Feeling inspired already?
LAST WEEK ON TRIBAL APOCALYPSE...
- Event Number: 7.20, Week 333 BE
- Date: May 27
- Attendance: 18
- Rounds: 4
- Subformat: Regular
- Winner: TLR (Wizard)
- 1 Loss: mathguy31415 (Human), Armont (Beast), Socanelas (Construct), Gonzzy (Goblin), Deonmag ( Scarecrow)
- Underdog Prize: Deonmag ( Scarecrow)
- Tribes: Beast, Construct (x2), Faerie, Goblin (x2), Human (x4), Kithkin, Knight (x2), Rat, Scarecrow, Soltari, Vampire, Wizard
- Event link (with all players, pairings, standings, decks, and results): here it is
Third win in career, first of the year for TLR, who engineered the comeback of a combo deck we haven't seen around in a while: Cephalid Breakfast. Remember that? Cephalid Illusionist
being targeted by Nomads en-Kor a bunch of times so you can dump your entire deck into the graveyard, then reanimate something by sacrificing Narcomoeba
s to Dread Return
? It was played massively during the 2013 season by Robin88, who brought it to Tribal Apocalypse for the last time in May 2014. Then the archetype was somehow abandoned, with only one lonesome and not very fortunate attempt to revive it by hexalite in 2015, with this list. Now TLR has played it three times in the last month, finally piloting it to a first place here.
Robin's classic build had a Kor shell, to better accommodate the Nomads, and an endgame where Dread Return would bring back The Mimeoplasm
copying a Murderous Redcap
made gigantic by Lord of Extinction
's power (in turn made gigantic by the fact that the entire deck is in the graveyard).
Instead, TLR chose to go the route hexalite had so briefly explored two years ago, a plan that ultimately sees Angel of Glory's Rise
being returned from the graveyard, bringing along Laboratory Maniac
and Azami, Lady of Scrolls
for the non-damage-dealing win.
This means the shells is now Wizard, i.e. the Cephalid's secondary tribe, with the Kor being the one included off-tribe this time. It's probably a stronger shell for the combo, offering protection in the form of Meddling Mage
and Cursecatcher
, and tutoring for the Cephalid in the form of Vedalken Aethermage
's bizarre wizardcycling. Also, Trinket Mage
perfectly replaces Stoneforge Mystic
as a fetcher of Shuko
, the alternate trigger for the Cephalid (the deck could easily avoid the Kor altogether, but Shuko's equip activation is sorcery-speed, so inherently more fragile). It's a great build, even if the Mimeoplasm win was certainly cooler.
Moving on, we have first-time-player mathguy31415, doing well with this Thalia-based white weenie Human build, which I'm featuring mostly because it was piloted by a promising newcomer. Welcome to Tribal Apocalypse! (I'm glad to see so many new names this year, possibly signaling a new generation of tribal players, but I still harbor hope to lure our historical champions mihahitlor and romellos back).
But speaking of Human aggro, littlefield surprised me adding green to the usual mix, out of love for Mayor of Avabruck
, apparently (plus a bit of acceleration in Avacyn's Pilgrim
). Also, Metallic Mimic is starting to pop up in these builds. One reason more to feel justified in bringing artifact hate along.
THE HIGH PRICE OF WINNING
Here's the prices of all the featured decks, courtesy of the amazing Deck Pricer from mtgGoldfish (MTGO Traders prices as of June 2, 2017):
The Top 10 Cheapest Decks that Went Undefeated
- mihahitlor's Warriors, $1.95, 1st place on Event 233
- morpphling's Vampires, $2.25, 1st place on Event 285
- morpphling's Goblins, $2.35, 2nd place on Event 102
- JogandoPelado's Berserkers, $2.80, 1st place on Event 248
- Gq1rf7's Goblins, $3.32, 1st place on Event 154
- MisterMojoRising's Insects, $3.55, 2nd place on Event 201
- Gq1rf7's Goblins, $3.58, 1st place on Event 169
- Gq1rf7's Goblins, $3.70, 1st place on Event 145
- Gq1rf7's Goblins, $4.12, 2nd place on Event 141
- Gq1rf7's Assassins, $4.18, 1st place on Event 147
The Top 5 Cheapest Non-Goblin Decks that Went Undefeated
- mihahitlor's Warriors, $1.95, 1st place on Event 233
- morpphling's Vampires, $2.25, 1st place on Event 285
- JogandoPelado's Berserkers, $2.80, 1st place on Event 248
- MisterMojoRising's Insects, $3.55, 2nd place on Event 201
- Gq1rf7's Assassins, $4.18, 1st place on Event 147
NOTE: not adjusted to current prices; data collected since Event 85.
ANNOUNCEMENT TIME!
Just to remind you of a few things:
The Bolas Prize: The first player to win a game by activating Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker
's third ability for lethal damage will get a 3-tix credit certificate from MTGO Traders. Be cruel or go home!
The Underdog Prize: During any event of the regular rotation (but not during the one-time special events), all players who are running an Underdog Tribe are eligible for a 1-tix credit certificate from MTGO Traders. The tie-breakers are first the number of Underdog categories (for instance, a tribe that's simultaneously Endangered and Unhallowed will take the prize over one that's only Endangered), then the points achieved in the final standings. During Underdog events, only the True Underdog tribes are rewarded (those are the tribes belonging to all three categories of Underdog at once).
The Up-and-Coming Prize: When a tribe wins an event for the first time ever (losing Unhallowed status), its pilot will get a 3-tix certificate from MTGO Traders.
The New Kids on the Block Award: When a new tribe is introduced in the game, or reaches enough members to be played as a proper tribe (i.e. at least 3 members, so you can build a deck that features 4 copies of each plus 8 Changeling creatures), the first player to score a match win with it will get a 3-tix certificate from MTGO Traders. You'll need a hard win, not a BYE or a win by no-show of your opponent. The tribes currently eligible for the award are Camel, Gremlin, Hippo, Hyena, Monkey.
The Repopulation Award: Some tribes get played only once (to get the New Kids on the Block Award) and then forgotten. Never again! Register one of the following tribes three times in different events, then play all rounds of those events with them, and you'll get a 3-tix certificate from MTGO Traders. The list of these tribes, established May 5, 2017, is as follows: Antelope, Atog, Crocodile, Goat, Homarid, Incarnation, Jackal, Leech, Licid, Manticore, Metathran, Monger, Moonfolk, Nightstalker, Octopus, Orgg, Ouphe, Ox, Processor, Rabbit, Salamander, Siren, Slith.
The Hamtastic Award: The Biodiversity Prize dedicated to the memory of Erik Friborg rewards each player who registers 10 different tribes (except Human, Elf and Goblin) during the year with a 3-tix certificate from MTGO Traders. You can go on and win the prize multiple times in the year, but you need to keep playing different tribes! (So if you manage to register 50 different tribes in one season, you can get up to 15 tix!)
The Top Players Lockout: Every time a Top Player (either a Google Era Top 8, an Ultimate Champion/Tribal Player of the Year, or a seasonal Top 8) will end undefeated, they will not be allowed to register the same tribe and deck again for 5 events (i.e. they'll have to register a different deck or decks 5 times before coming back to the undefeated one). With "deck" is meant a specific, recognizable archetype (e.g. Wall-Drazi), which in some case will be linked to a specific combo card (e.g. Helm of Obedience
). A list of the current lockouts is maintained here.
Wanna test your deck? Tell us when you're online, and look who else is there and when! All of this here!
WHAT'S NEXT
The upcoming Tribal Apocalypse events of the Blippian Era (every Saturday at 17:00 GMT):
- 7.21 (Week 334 BE), on June 3: Underdog
- 7.22 (Week 335 BE), on June 10: Regular
- 7.23 (Week 336 BE), on June 17: Pure
- 7.24 (Week 337 BE), on June 24: Regular
Check out all the rules for the sub-formats!
Check out the full Tribal Calendar for 2017!
SEE YOU ALL IN THE TRIBAL ROOM!
