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By: Kumagoro42, Gianluca Aicardi
Dec 01 2017 1:00pm
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 Welcome back to Tribal Apocalypse!

   Table of Contents 

  1. Last Week on Tribal Apocalypse...
  2. The High Price of Winning
  3. Announcement Time!
  4. What's Next

Check the full archive for the "Diaries of the Apocalypse" series


THOUGHTS OF A TRIBAL HOST
by Kumagoro

 Hey! Today's the first day on (traditional) Advent calendars! Which suddenly makes this card surprisingly blasphemous.

 It reminds me that sometimes I'd like to be able to massively reprogram Gatherling's filter (it's possible, just not very feasible these days) to create a format where cards like these have the Tribal supertype (man, how immediately obsolete did that type become right after being created?), so we could decide that noncreature cards with the Tribal supertype belongs to the specified tribe the same way creature cards do, fulfilling the "one third, rounded down" Tribal Wars clause. Wouldn't it be fun? Of course it wouldn't be easy (nor quick) to establish which noncreature card belongs to which tribe, because for instance, it's safe to say Goblin Dirigible and Goblin Assault should be Goblin Tribal cards, but Goblin Charbelcher is just something Goblin-made that could be used by whoever has it, and doesn't particularly do anything specific within Goblin decks. And so on. Plus, Elf would probably be able to field a 60-card Tribal Wars deck with no creature cards at all.


LAST WEEK ON TRIBAL APOCALYPSE...

  • Event Number: 7.46, Week 359 BE
  • Date: November 25
  • Attendance: 8
  • Rounds: 3
  • Subformat: Regular
  • Winner: Socanelas (Construct)
  • 1 Loss: Golden_Lin (Elf), TLR (Beast), Generalissimo (Merfolk)
  • Underdog Prize: lovetapsmtg (Siren)
  • Tribes: Beast, Construct, Elf, Knight, Merfolk, Siren, Wall
  • Event link (with all players, pairings, standings, decks, and results): here it is

 Smallest event of the year, due to Thanksgiving weekend, but also a general fall in attendance we experienced this year (I'll talk about it in another installment). Socanelas put another first place in thanks to the Constructs, which this year have won three events with three different pilots.

 

 Beast made a good show of itself, courtesy of TLR and Living End. It's not something that happens very frequently in Regular events but the cycling creatures from Amonkhet block might have given the archetype a little boost.

 

 This very unusual Merfolk deck by Generalissimo also deserves a shout-out. It's a complicate net of creatures that want to be tapped, but not necessarily while risking an attack, like Stonybrook Schoolmaster, Grimoire Thief, Fallowsage, Surgespanner, and Judge of Currents, paired with things that tap creatures for value, especially Cryptolith Rite, but also Drowner of Secrets, Summon the School, and of course Merrow Reejerey (even in a wildly peculiar Merfolk build like this one, one of the lords had to show up). To cap it all, Kiora's Follower untaps what has been tapped to do it again.

 

 I just noticed that back in Lorwyn they were using the term "school" in its most common meaning of "place where kids go to learn stuff", rather than "group of sea creatures", and that's the same pun Finding Nemo did! And yes, it's pretty silly within the context of a game of fantasy battles.


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 December 1, 2017):

 The Top 10 Cheapest Decks that Went Undefeated

  1. mihahitlor's Warriors, $1.95, 1st place on Event 233
  2. morpphling's Vampires, $2.25, 1st place on Event 285
  3. morpphling's Goblins, $2.35, 2nd place on Event 102
  4. JogandoPelado's Berserkers, $2.80, 1st place on Event 248
  5. kokonade1000's Berserkers, $2.95, 2nd place on Event 354
  6. Gq1rf7's Goblins, $3.32, 1st place on Event 154
  7. MisterMojoRising's Insects, $3.55, 2nd place on Event 201
  8. Gq1rf7's Goblins, $3.58, 1st place on Event 169
  9. Gq1rf7's Goblins, $3.70, 1st place on Event 145
  10. Gq1rf7's Goblins, $4.12, 2nd place on Event 141

 The Top 5 Cheapest Non-Goblin Decks that Went Undefeated

  1. mihahitlor's Warriors, $1.95, 1st place on Event 233
  2. morpphling's Vampires, $2.25, 1st place on Event 285
  3. JogandoPelado's Berserkers, $2.80, 1st place on Event 248
  4. kokonade1000's Berserkers, $2.95, 2nd place on Event 354
  5. MisterMojoRising's Insects, $3.55, 2nd place on Event 201

 NOTE: not adjusted to current prices; data collected since Event 85.


ANNOUNCEMENT TIME!

 Just to remind you of a few things:

 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, Leech, Licid, Metathran, Monger, Moonfolk, Nightstalker, Octopus, Orgg, Ouphe, Processor, Rabbit, Salamander, Siren, Slith. Already cleared: Jackal, Manticore, Ox.

 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):

  • 7.47 (Week 360 BE), on December 2: Underdog
  • 7.48 (Week 361 BE), on December 9: Regular
  • 7.49 (Week 362 BE), on December 16: Pure
  • 7.50 (Week 363 BE), on December 23: 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!

5 Comments

Back in the day, Lorwyn by AJ_Impy at Fri, 12/01/2017 - 16:30
AJ_Impy's picture
5

Back in the day, Lorwyn Tribal Standard was a format put on the client to match up with an offline promotional idea, in which tribal cards counted towards their tribe. Yes, it was completely possible to build creatureless tribal decks, even with just the cards we had. Here's two examples and a breakdown of the pre-Morningtide tribals available at the time. http://puremtgo.com/node/685

After Morningtide, The Tribal type resurfaced briefly in Rise of the Eldrazi, before sinking forever without a trace. It appeared in just the four sets total. (Its preview in Future Sight on Bound in Silence rounding out the quartet.)

That deck was actually an by Generalissimo at Sat, 12/02/2017 - 13:03
Generalissimo's picture

That deck was actually an attempt to rework an Opposition deck I ran about 2-and-a-half years into something that wasn't insufferably tedious and boring to play online and, while it's not as bad as the Opposition version, I really can't say I succeeded; it always eventually reaches a point where you're spending vastly more time operating the interface than making decisions and it just becomes a chore to play.

I remembered the deck's name, by Kumagoro42 at Sat, 12/02/2017 - 14:48
Kumagoro42's picture

I remembered the deck's name, indeed (which I still don't know where it came from).

It's a Futurama quote: Leela: by Generalissimo at Sat, 12/02/2017 - 15:26
Generalissimo's picture

It's a Futurama quote:

Leela: I'm afraid Fry is suffering from ocean madness.

Fry: Every time something good happens to me you say it's some kind of madness. Or I'm drunk. Or I ate too much candy. Well I saw a real mermaid. And I wish for once my friends would have decency and kindness to believe me.

Leela: [whispers] Ocean madness.

[Fry storms out]

Professor Hubert Farnsworth: He may have ocean madness, but that's no excuse for ocean rudeness.

Oh, cool. by Kumagoro42 at Tue, 12/05/2017 - 10:29
Kumagoro42's picture

Oh, cool.