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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

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THOUGHTS OF A TRIBAL HOST
by Kumagoro

 So, last week (meaning in the event I reported on last week, and which was played two weeks ago), an Aluren deck took the win. I've been asked to check if it's happening too frequently – which I was already pretty sure it doesn't, but I did check, and here's what I found: all the lists running Aluren in Tribal Apocalypse in the Gatherling era.

Season	Date	Player	Event Type	Tribe	Result
5	18-Jul-2015	Bazaar of Baghdad	Regular	Bird	4-0
6	23-Apr-2016	ScionOfJustice	Regular	Bird	3-1
6	28-May-2016	Bazaar of Baghdad	Regular	Human	5-0
7	22-Apr-2017	Bazaar of Baghdad	Regular	Human	2-1
7	8-Jul-2017	BoozeMongoose	Regular	Human	2-1
7	9-Sep-2017	BoozeMongoose	Regular	Bird	4-0
8	24-Feb-2018	BoozeMongoose	Regular	Human	4-0

 There's data before that, because I certainly remember Ayanam1 playing a Human/Aluren deck in Season 1 (he famously never played the same deck twice, so that would be his only outing with the archetype). But as far as the last 3-4 seasons are concerned, we can see Aluren never shows up more than a couple times per season, with the exception of Season 7, where it had 3 outings, but only one of them lead to an undefeated result. So far so good, I'd say.

 And while I acknowledge the power of the combo, I want to point out that it's a creature-based combo, so it's inherently different than, say, Helm of Obedience. Of course, should it start to appear more consistently, to the point of twisting the events it takes part in, measures will be taken. We can see it's only played in Regular events, anyway: Underdog lacks good tribal shells for it, while Pure has currently banned it (not sure why it was never tried before, it won't be now). And of course, Modern is out of reach to begin with.

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LAST WEEK ON TRIBAL APOCALYPSE...

• Event Number: 8.08, Week 373 BE
• Date: March 3
• Attendance: 9
• Rounds: 3
• Subformat: Underdog
• Winner: Generalissimo (Scout)
• Runner-up: Golden_Lin (Rat)
• 1 Loss: Bandit Keith (Rat), _Kumagoro_ (Ooze), Deonmag ( Scarecrow)
• Underdog Prize: Sedat3D (Dinosaur)
• Repopulation Award: lovetapsmtg (Processor)
• Tribes: Dinosaur, Insect, Ooze, Processor, Rat (x2), Scarecrow, Scout, Soltari
• Event link (with all players, pairings, standings, decks, and results): here it is

 Second win in career for Generalissimo, one of Tribal Apocalypse's master experimenters. Fittingly, the build that earned him this latest 4-0 is a cool combo machine that uses Scout as a shell to have fun with Saffi Eriksdotter and Renegade Rallier infinitely recurring each other after the latter has become fodder for Blasting Station. Extremely click-intensive, but rewarding. And the list is able to easily take the aggro route when needed, thanks to powerful new Scouts like Merfolk Branchwalker and Tireless Tracker (which interacts perfectly with its tribe's most common land-fetching members), or old semi-forgotten guys like Safehold Elite (which is also a secondary way to Blast away the opponent, thanks to the always combo-friendly Melira).

 

 Among the other successful decks, yours truly has finally made his way back into positive results, thanks to this Stompy-like Ooze deck.

 

 The thing about Ooze played this way (as opposed to Necrotic Ooze combo, which I was more familiar with) is that you have three excellent tribesmembers in Scavenging Ooze, Predator Ooze and Acidic Slime (despite the fact that the slime's higher cost doesn't make it exactly Stompy material per se). Experiment One seems like it should also be great in a fast aggro build, but it actually is not, because all the other Oozes are native 2/2s at most, so evolve is not going to work more than once. And then the 5th green Ooze is just bad. I wanted to keep the curve low, so after immediately discarding Mwonvuli Ooze, I went with Gluttonous Slime over the larger Inexorable Blob, 'cause I figured my deck won't hit delirium consistently, if at all, and the Slime's flash is a nice trick to surprise some attacker, maybe while eating some underwhelming Experiment One or Nissa's Plant tokens. Plus, three of the other four Oozes already had the ability to put counters on them, so the deck was going to have Hardened Scales. Still, I look forward to the printing or at least one other strong green Ooze soon enough.

 Finally, Dinosaur decks start showing up. Here's Sedat3D's version. In hindsight, Dinosaurs weren't ready to be Major League, they're clearly at home in Underdog.

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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 March 9, 2018):

• Generalissimo's Scouts: $42.01
• _Kumagoro_'s Oozes: $80.74
• Sedat3D's Dinosaurs: $131.56

 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.

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

 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!

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 WHAT'S NEXT

 The upcoming Tribal Apocalypse events of the Blippian Era (every Saturday at 17:00 GMT):

• 8.09 (Week 374 BE), on March 10: Regular
• 8.10 (Week 375 BE), on March 17: Modern
• 8.11 (Week 376 BE), on March 24: Regular
• 8.14 (Week 377 BE), on March 31: Singleton

Check out all the rules for the sub-formats!

Check out the full Tribal Calendar for 2018!

SEE YOU ALL IN THE TRIBAL ROOM!