I've also been testing allies. The principle weaknesses of allies is that they are very vulnerable to sweepers and they have little card advantage outlets. I've thought of a few ways to address these issues. Here are my current thoughts on allies.
Black and White Allies - I like the Patriarch's Bidding answer against sweepers. I am currently testing putting in Darkblast and a tutor or two to really go for the bidding combo. Other than that, black addresses a lot of the card advantage issues that allies have and also gives allies acceleration (Dark Ritual) and decent removal options.
4 Mortify / Vindicate / Swords to Plowshares
4 Phyrexian Arena / Necropotence if it's not banned. I can't remember off the top of my head.
3 Dark Rituals
2 Patriarch's Bidding
4 Bojuka Bog
20 Other Land
Naya Allies - This version has a turn 3 kill. Turn 1 Freeblade, turn 2 Battlesinger. turn 3 Battlesinger Freeblade. If you're going to go "all in" with allies you might as well hit them hard and fast, and you can't do that without a Battlesinger.
Wow you know somehow I've been misreading that for weeks... I talk about it as the black veneral bloom in my enchantment article and I've said it to other people and no one has corrected me >< you're right I misread the card and have been looking stupid to people for weeks now talking about it LOL well some days are just like that what can I say?
I thought it was pretty clear that I was joking. Apparently it was not. For those of you that thought it was an insult, I apologize. Not intended. Nor was I really saying that I thought the opponents were bad - but some of them clearly had a different/atypical set of card valuations. Which is fine.
Second: Cutting / Hideous End
I don't think that black was "ignored" in the draft. I think it was cut. As for the End, who knows what was in that pack to start with. For those of you that listen to the Limited Resources podcast, remember the insane crack-a-pack a while back? It had, IIRC, an Eldrazi Monument, Foil Malakir Bloodwitch, Vampire Nighthawk, Burst Lightning, Skyfisher, Welkin Tern and some other good stuff. Let's assume that a player opened a pack like this (because it explains the End, without resorting to assuming that everyone else is just too bad to recognize really good removal.)
Player opening takes either Monument (to keep colors open), the Witch or Burst Lightning (to avoid battling in black.)
Players 2& 3 probably take the other two cards.
Players 4 & 5, therefor, have a choice of Hideous End, Skyfisher, Tern and Burst Lightning. Assuming that they were already set in their colors, and the colors were not black, passing the Hideous End is reasonable. Burst over end if you are not black is certainly correct. Skyfisher over En, if you can't play End, also seems correct. Seeing Hideous End could mean that the players took junk over great cards - or it could mean that the pack was insane to start with.
Now we cannot know what cards the players who took the Bloodwitch and Nighthawk, assuming those were there, may have seen in packs 2, 3 and maybe 4, but we know what they could see in the rest of the packs. After all, I passed them - the person that opened the Hideous End was 2 seats to my left.
My pack 1, their pack 3: Hagra Croc, Blood Seeker,
Pack 2: Hagra Diabolist, Bog Tatters, Sell-Sword
Pack 3: Ravenous Trap, Croc, Vampire's Bite
Pack 4: Blood Tribute, Piranah Marsh
Pack 5: Bog Tatters, Sasdistic Sacrament
Pack 6: Blood Seeker, Descecrated Earth
Pack 7: no black
Pack 8: Mire Blight
Pack 9: Croc
Pack 10: Bog Tatters
etc.
Even if someone opened insane black, that run of cards should show that black was being cut, and it could/should have forced the Bloodwitch and Nighthawk players out of black.
The exact contents of the Hideous End pack don't matter - the point is that a couple bombs, a foil/rare drafter and a few people already set in other colors can explain the Hideous End.
(I probably should have included this in the article. ah, well. Hindsight is 20/20...)
Third: Swiss drafts
I have nothing but praise for Swiss drafts, because if you want to try different strategies, if you are learning, or just want to relax, they are better value than the lose-and-you-are-out formats. I play them. I also play 4-3-2-2s and 8-4s. Further, I know that 8-4 drafts generally produces better articles, which is why we writers generally avoid using Swiss drafts as examples.
What I do find amusing is that one anonomous poster wondered what format (I never said - seemed obvious / irrelevant), and a couple posts later someone takes it as gospel and is ranting about Swiss drafts.
Let's try and get our information straight. Seems like a good idea for an information session like this.
How is Legacy coming and relegating classic to a weekend format it's "death"? Is Pauper "dead"? Maybe 100 CS is "dead"? If so, why are people still writing about it, or playing it?
I "attacked the magic community"? As far as I remember, I threw a fake april fools's hissy fit against them releasing the MOCs after CQ was already running a WoTC-sponsored Player of the Year on our own site.
Lastly, how is it "karmic"? In any way? I'd love that one explained to me...
I have commented several times on your articles, as I think your one of the better writers on PureMTGO.
This article did not really teach me anything, and I do think calling people idiots is bad form.
But for all the people on here just being rude, well are you not fighting a fire with fire?
Pete's articles are usually of a good standard, and to be honest Pete's right.... what have most of us done to enhance the Magic community? And also have we not all uttered in our heads when an opponent makes a bad play.... "Idiot", I think we have. The mistake Pete made, was saying it out loud.
Just my thoughts on what is fast becoming an out of hand debate.
To start off, I rarely if ever, comment on articles on the internet. In this case I will make the exception.
First of all, after reading the article in full I found a bitter taste left in my mouth. The arrogance with which you write, and the loathing you offer your fellow player in the form of insults is pretty pathetic. From your picture you appear to be an adult. You claim to have been writing for 11 years. You would think that at some point in your 11 years of writing you would have learned a little something about what your readers expect. You should have seen that this was a poor article to begin with, simply by proofreading it.
Then you take exception with the comments. I laughed and then just shook my head at your reply. Seriously? This is how an adult reacts to what equates to mostly teens replies. Not that it should even matter. I would find it fairly humorous if some 11 year old "anonymous" came to your house to get his "literal crap beaten from his literal body." Your whole rant shows you don't think before you write. 11 years of writing and you have to succumb to "f#$%@k you" kinds of comments? Maybe instead of getting paid to write self glorifying articles like this, in a failed attempt at covering the real intent of it, with a Title like "cutting colors", You should invest some of your money in a Creative Writing course and Maybe some Anger Management therapy. It is quite obvious you have the need for both.
On a final note, I am going to say something you should already know. You are writing articles on the internet. This means that anyone and everyone is welcome to leave any comment they desire at any time that this article is posted. This includes worship hounds, Trolls, Flames, genuine criticism and genuine praise. This also occurs almost immediately. You wrote an article where more people commented negatively than positively. Take that for what it is. It was a poor article. Learn from that and carry on. Don't argue with the general public, "your readers", take what they have to say, comment where warranted and write a better article next time. This is the first article I have read of yours, and I can tell you now it will probably be my last. If I were the owners of puremtgo.com I would never have you write another article for me again and would look to find a better author and one who can control themselves. Take this comment how you like. chances are I won't read a reply.
Blau no like green allies. Green allies remind Blau of Hulk. Hulk good if Hulk smash. Not good if not smashing. Blau say listen to LE and play only blue and white. White have creature smash cards that get rid of annoying no-ally creatures. Ally Smash!!!
I didn't bother to look at the last article where we talked about allies, but I think we said the same thing then. Allies need to be white and blue. The green is nice if you can get Harabaz Druid into play. It really lets you hit that Rite really quick. The problem is ANY removal spell kills the Druid. Even my my terrible deck (which for some reason you didn't post..... oh wait terrible) I managed to squeak out a single game win against Allies because in that game I killed his Harabaz Druid and that set him back a bunch of turns.
I will disagree with LE though and say avoid the Blue control cards. Allies LOVE to tap out, much like slivers, so packing your deck with counterspells does nothing. Winter Wolf is going to play that Chain Reaction the second you tap out. Pact of Negation/FoW is really the only answer. Should a sweeper resolve then you have a hand full of counters and no creatures in play. Seems pointless. I like going with white removal. Swords and Path are cheap and efficient. There is a good chance you will have mana left to cast those.
Those 24 creatures can win either via milling with Halimar Excavator or via attacking. Ondu Cleric and Talus Paladin will keep you alive long enough, so they're very important.
Considering you will also play 24 lands, this will leave 12 slots for your other spells. 4 should be Join the Ranks. 4 should be Swords to Plowshares (or Path to Exile). Then add 4 counterspells. Negate would work. Counterspell would work. Cryptic Command would most definately work.
You may also try 23 lands and 15 other spells. I'm not sure if this will work or not, but at least it's worth a try. Then you may try playing 5 counterspells instead of 4. Those can be 2 Cryptic Command for late turns and 3 Negate for earlier turns. Or 2 Cryptic Command, 2 Negate (or Remove Soul, or Counterspell etc...) and 1 Pact of Negation.
Alternatively you may try 3x Talus Paladin, 3x Hada Freeblade and thus play 22 creatures. You may even try 3x Kazandu Blademasters making your creature count 21. Those 3 slots you can use for more counterspells or for removal.
But whichever counterspells you choose to use, make sure that Cryptic Command is one of them.
WOW! I am not kidding, in my company similar tirade resulted in mandatory mental health check of the employee. The poor guy ended up, you know where. Relax man, I can say for myself that I mostly love your articles. Just be at peace with yourself that you are doing public business and you are subject to public opinion.
Oddly enough, the deck I played had little connection to the wrath and reanimate build I made for that article. The decks share twelve creatures, twelve lands and a creature type, but whereas the previous deck tried to get clever with reanimation, this was straightforward high octane acceleration. The two decks play very differently.
As for why your deck didn't quite make it, if I had to put my finger anywhere, I'd say interactivity. No sweepers, 4 cards capable of dealing with a single creature (8 if you count Rite to kill legends or invoke clever shenanigans on an opponent's creature), it basically attempts to do its thing regardless of what the opponent is doing. Evolver's elves get away with that because it is possible for them to overwhelm other opposition before they hit their wrath effects, monocolor lending them phenomenal speed when coupled with one of the three most synergetic tribes in the game.
The rest, however, dedicate a lot of slots to dealing with the opponent's creations. Winter.Wolf, 8 sweepers of which 6 one-sided, plus Mangara and the means to recur him. Me, 8 sweepers plus 8 mass edict effects, consecutive or concurrent. Proclaim, 12 single target removal of which 2 repeatable, 2 pyroclasm. Shuyin, 2 sweepers, 4 edicts and 4 deathtouch fliers, plus the power of bombardment coupled with his bloodghasts. Unless you can overwhelm your opponent, there's every chance they can rip your deck apart whilst you can at best mildly inconvenience them or oppose with five of their best creature. Your deck relies on achieving a critical mass of allies in play, so you can see why a sweeper heavy environment might cause problems.
How to fix it? Keep doing what you're doing. Innovate. Experiment. Analyse the potential metagame and make sure you can meet and match the worst it can throw at you. You will lose, you will fall short, you'll come up against decks that perfectly answer your strategy, and all that doesn't matter and is largely out of your control, because one week you will be the perfect answer to everyone elses' strategy. Meet with triumph and disaster, treat them both the same.
For an article with the title "Basics of Drafting" you seem to have a lot of disdain for casual and/or inexperienced drafters. Aren't they your target audience? Claiming that "idiots" all of a sudden means "tired and distracted" is a pretty weak defense, and then to come back on later and go on a tirade just made it worse. You should have just admitted you make a poor choice of words and left it at that.
The problem with the piece isn't that it was swiss or that you called your opponents idiots due to poor plays, its that it doesn't do what its stated aim was which was to show the power of cutting a color. The sixth pick hideous end in the first pack shows that no one was playing black. You could make the argument that no one changed over to black because you were cutting it but its difficult to really say so one way or the other. After that, the match reports are boring because your deck is so strong so it ends up being a poor piece of writing of little strategic value. I think that's all that people were trying to say. I'm sorry if you got offended but I believe your response crosses the line and makes you look bad and supremely arrogant (so you wrote a bad piece. no big deal. it happens. no need to defend yourself and snap. you've written great pieces before and you'll do it again) where beforehand it looked like they were in the wrong.
I mean, Pete, lets be serious here. You may have been writing articles for 11 years, but you write for EVERYONE.
A) This is poor editing on PureMTGO's part. I would have never let an article pass if it called potential readers "idiots" or "mentally retarded" even if they truly were.
B) Your reaction is even MORE out of line, you blatantly buy into what the trolls want. Have you not been on the internet for more than 2 years? This happens all the time.
C) Swiss draft? Really? You get paid enough to pay for a draft set(from what I know about what pure pays), why not risk it in 8-4?
This^^^ Just Yes! Unfortunately there is no way to remove anonymous from these boards unless puremtgo adopted an Identification policy similar to other sites where you have to use your MTGO ID and confirm it online before being allowed to post.
Planeswalkers have made more than 5 showings in 2009- heck im sure yam lampron(creator of ultimatewalker, has a thread on deck on the source) has more than 4-5 top 8's in 09 with it.
A lot of the decks were old and not played anymore like: Alluren,uw control is obseleted by uw tempo, Astral Slide can only be piloted by the 1 n only morgan coke.
Red Death is a really fun deck sometimes and usually packs D.Rituals to power out helmline or sides it in.
then what the f^%&^K are you doing wasting time reading it, or bothering to write a post? Get a life.
28 comments so far, and the amount of vitriol is amazing. What the hell did I ever do to you people?
I have now been writing Magic articles for just a bit under 11 years. In all that time, I have had maybe three sets of feedback that have made me really think "f*ck this, life's too short." This is one.
I'm not a pro. Never claimed to be. I'm not a limited expert, and have often said that I'm not. I'm just a writer. It takes hours to get an article together, and the amount I get paid is about half minimum wage in my state. I can make a whole lot more per hour building furniture. However, I, like most of us writers, write because I want to share stories and maybe teach a little something. We writers are trying to contribute a little something to the community, etc. We do what we can because we can. Why do you feel a need to piss on that?
Mr Anonymous, what single useful, productive, meaningful thing have you done in your entire wretched little life to justify yourself? I have to say that I have never heard of you doing anything. Is your entire purpose in life simply to spread the misery or your empty, meaningless existence to everyone you can? Well, f#$%@k you, you've succeeded. Right now, I'm hurt and pissed, and if any of you would care to come to my house, I would be more than happy to see if I really can literally beat the crap out of someone. I would love to try.
Yes, I know, I'm pissing back at anonymous shits on the Internet. I'm mad enough that I don't care how futile and pointless that is.
And as for that last poster - at the moment, at least - I don't have to log on anonymously to post in my own defense. I do so under my own name, and what's more, I even know what the shift key does, you moldy little rat turd. Christ, you don't even know that raredrafters mainly hit the 8-4 queues. That's the best place to score a pile of rares...
Yes, I know how pointless this is, but I need to spew a little hatred, bitterness and venom right now, because I am pretty full of it. Maybe this is therapeutic. Maybe this will post will be deleted by JXC. And maybe I should go to bed and dream pleasant little dreams. Dreams like: "Hello Mr. Baseball Bat. Hello Mr. Kneecap belonging to A. Nony. Mous. So glad you two could meet."
To all of you who put their names to the feedback, thank you for your comments. Even when they are negative, they can at least help me - and other writers - get a little better.
To those of you who did not see fit to include your name, f@ck you.
whoa, this was a swiss draft? ive said it be4 and i say it again, you cant learn anything from swiss drafting. the people who swiss are out of their minds and cannot justify picks. usually its 2 qp sharks and 6 rare drafters. oy! i was unmoved when i saw the 'cutting' ability, but now its just a WOW moment in magic draft capture.
oh, and im pretty sure that comment from anon defending this guy is this guy, just saying
I think that anyone who's being critical for the article referring to the opponents as idiots isn't being honest with themselves. I understand playing paper magic where your opponent is sitting right there in front of you, but online, I wager that everyone who sees blatant misplays or bad picks isn't giving their esteemed, faceless opponents the allowance of a politically correct designation in their internal monologues.
Wow..
if Dangerlinto is pretty upset about it, I'd probably be upset by proxy.
If there is a choice for me, I'll always choose Vintage over Legacy and by that, I mean Classic over Legacy as well.
I didn't listen to the podcast. So I have only baseless opinions on it.
I've also been testing allies. The principle weaknesses of allies is that they are very vulnerable to sweepers and they have little card advantage outlets. I've thought of a few ways to address these issues. Here are my current thoughts on allies.
Black and White Allies - I like the Patriarch's Bidding answer against sweepers. I am currently testing putting in Darkblast and a tutor or two to really go for the bidding combo. Other than that, black addresses a lot of the card advantage issues that allies have and also gives allies acceleration (Dark Ritual) and decent removal options.
3 Bala Ged Thief
3 Hagra Diabolist
4 Hada Freeblade
4 Kazandu Blademaster
3 Ondu Cleric
3 Kabira Evangel
3 Talus Paladin
4 Mortify / Vindicate / Swords to Plowshares
4 Phyrexian Arena / Necropotence if it's not banned. I can't remember off the top of my head.
3 Dark Rituals
2 Patriarch's Bidding
4 Bojuka Bog
20 Other Land
Naya Allies - This version has a turn 3 kill. Turn 1 Freeblade, turn 2 Battlesinger. turn 3 Battlesinger Freeblade. If you're going to go "all in" with allies you might as well hit them hard and fast, and you can't do that without a Battlesinger.
4 Hada Freeblade
3 Harabaz Druid
4 Akoum Battlesinger
4 Kabira Evangel
3 Talus Paladin
3 Kazuul Warlord
3 Join the Ranks
4 Lightning Bolts
4 Punishing Fire
2 Pyrokinesis
4 Grove of Burnwillows
20 Other Land
zasp - yes that was pointed out in an earlier comment read above please :)
menace - I can only go off of the numbers I found, if there were more showings I missed it's just a fault of human error
Wow you know somehow I've been misreading that for weeks... I talk about it as the black veneral bloom in my enchantment article and I've said it to other people and no one has corrected me >< you're right I misread the card and have been looking stupid to people for weeks now talking about it LOL well some days are just like that what can I say?
One last comment, then I'm probably done, too.
First: "idiots"
I thought it was pretty clear that I was joking. Apparently it was not. For those of you that thought it was an insult, I apologize. Not intended. Nor was I really saying that I thought the opponents were bad - but some of them clearly had a different/atypical set of card valuations. Which is fine.
Second: Cutting / Hideous End
I don't think that black was "ignored" in the draft. I think it was cut. As for the End, who knows what was in that pack to start with. For those of you that listen to the Limited Resources podcast, remember the insane crack-a-pack a while back? It had, IIRC, an Eldrazi Monument, Foil Malakir Bloodwitch, Vampire Nighthawk, Burst Lightning, Skyfisher, Welkin Tern and some other good stuff. Let's assume that a player opened a pack like this (because it explains the End, without resorting to assuming that everyone else is just too bad to recognize really good removal.)
Player opening takes either Monument (to keep colors open), the Witch or Burst Lightning (to avoid battling in black.)
Players 2& 3 probably take the other two cards.
Players 4 & 5, therefor, have a choice of Hideous End, Skyfisher, Tern and Burst Lightning. Assuming that they were already set in their colors, and the colors were not black, passing the Hideous End is reasonable. Burst over end if you are not black is certainly correct. Skyfisher over En, if you can't play End, also seems correct. Seeing Hideous End could mean that the players took junk over great cards - or it could mean that the pack was insane to start with.
Now we cannot know what cards the players who took the Bloodwitch and Nighthawk, assuming those were there, may have seen in packs 2, 3 and maybe 4, but we know what they could see in the rest of the packs. After all, I passed them - the person that opened the Hideous End was 2 seats to my left.
My pack 1, their pack 3: Hagra Croc, Blood Seeker,
Pack 2: Hagra Diabolist, Bog Tatters, Sell-Sword
Pack 3: Ravenous Trap, Croc, Vampire's Bite
Pack 4: Blood Tribute, Piranah Marsh
Pack 5: Bog Tatters, Sasdistic Sacrament
Pack 6: Blood Seeker, Descecrated Earth
Pack 7: no black
Pack 8: Mire Blight
Pack 9: Croc
Pack 10: Bog Tatters
etc.
Even if someone opened insane black, that run of cards should show that black was being cut, and it could/should have forced the Bloodwitch and Nighthawk players out of black.
The exact contents of the Hideous End pack don't matter - the point is that a couple bombs, a foil/rare drafter and a few people already set in other colors can explain the Hideous End.
(I probably should have included this in the article. ah, well. Hindsight is 20/20...)
Third: Swiss drafts
I have nothing but praise for Swiss drafts, because if you want to try different strategies, if you are learning, or just want to relax, they are better value than the lose-and-you-are-out formats. I play them. I also play 4-3-2-2s and 8-4s. Further, I know that 8-4 drafts generally produces better articles, which is why we writers generally avoid using Swiss drafts as examples.
What I do find amusing is that one anonomous poster wondered what format (I never said - seemed obvious / irrelevant), and a couple posts later someone takes it as gospel and is ranting about Swiss drafts.
If you want to lose listeners, use this podcast as template for how to do it.
Let's try and get our information straight. Seems like a good idea for an information session like this.
How is Legacy coming and relegating classic to a weekend format it's "death"? Is Pauper "dead"? Maybe 100 CS is "dead"? If so, why are people still writing about it, or playing it?
I "attacked the magic community"? As far as I remember, I threw a fake april fools's hissy fit against them releasing the MOCs after CQ was already running a WoTC-sponsored Player of the Year on our own site.
Lastly, how is it "karmic"? In any way? I'd love that one explained to me...
Low quality stuff here guys.
Pete,
I have commented several times on your articles, as I think your one of the better writers on PureMTGO.
This article did not really teach me anything, and I do think calling people idiots is bad form.
But for all the people on here just being rude, well are you not fighting a fire with fire?
Pete's articles are usually of a good standard, and to be honest Pete's right.... what have most of us done to enhance the Magic community? And also have we not all uttered in our heads when an opponent makes a bad play.... "Idiot", I think we have. The mistake Pete made, was saying it out loud.
Just my thoughts on what is fast becoming an out of hand debate.
To start off, I rarely if ever, comment on articles on the internet. In this case I will make the exception.
First of all, after reading the article in full I found a bitter taste left in my mouth. The arrogance with which you write, and the loathing you offer your fellow player in the form of insults is pretty pathetic. From your picture you appear to be an adult. You claim to have been writing for 11 years. You would think that at some point in your 11 years of writing you would have learned a little something about what your readers expect. You should have seen that this was a poor article to begin with, simply by proofreading it.
Then you take exception with the comments. I laughed and then just shook my head at your reply. Seriously? This is how an adult reacts to what equates to mostly teens replies. Not that it should even matter. I would find it fairly humorous if some 11 year old "anonymous" came to your house to get his "literal crap beaten from his literal body." Your whole rant shows you don't think before you write. 11 years of writing and you have to succumb to "f#$%@k you" kinds of comments? Maybe instead of getting paid to write self glorifying articles like this, in a failed attempt at covering the real intent of it, with a Title like "cutting colors", You should invest some of your money in a Creative Writing course and Maybe some Anger Management therapy. It is quite obvious you have the need for both.
On a final note, I am going to say something you should already know. You are writing articles on the internet. This means that anyone and everyone is welcome to leave any comment they desire at any time that this article is posted. This includes worship hounds, Trolls, Flames, genuine criticism and genuine praise. This also occurs almost immediately. You wrote an article where more people commented negatively than positively. Take that for what it is. It was a poor article. Learn from that and carry on. Don't argue with the general public, "your readers", take what they have to say, comment where warranted and write a better article next time. This is the first article I have read of yours, and I can tell you now it will probably be my last. If I were the owners of puremtgo.com I would never have you write another article for me again and would look to find a better author and one who can control themselves. Take this comment how you like. chances are I won't read a reply.
Blau no like green allies. Green allies remind Blau of Hulk. Hulk good if Hulk smash. Not good if not smashing. Blau say listen to LE and play only blue and white. White have creature smash cards that get rid of annoying no-ally creatures. Ally Smash!!!
I didn't bother to look at the last article where we talked about allies, but I think we said the same thing then. Allies need to be white and blue. The green is nice if you can get Harabaz Druid into play. It really lets you hit that Rite really quick. The problem is ANY removal spell kills the Druid. Even my my terrible deck (which for some reason you didn't post..... oh wait terrible) I managed to squeak out a single game win against Allies because in that game I killed his Harabaz Druid and that set him back a bunch of turns.
I will disagree with LE though and say avoid the Blue control cards. Allies LOVE to tap out, much like slivers, so packing your deck with counterspells does nothing. Winter Wolf is going to play that Chain Reaction the second you tap out. Pact of Negation/FoW is really the only answer. Should a sweeper resolve then you have a hand full of counters and no creatures in play. Seems pointless. I like going with white removal. Swords and Path are cheap and efficient. There is a good chance you will have mana left to cast those.
I have a few suggestions for your Ally deck if I may.
I suggest removing Green completely for starters. Then I suggest this creature package:
4x Ondu Cleric
4x Halimar Excavator
4x Jwari Shapeshifter
4x Kazandu Blademaster
4x Hada Freeblade
4x Talus Paladin
Those 24 creatures can win either via milling with Halimar Excavator or via attacking. Ondu Cleric and Talus Paladin will keep you alive long enough, so they're very important.
Considering you will also play 24 lands, this will leave 12 slots for your other spells. 4 should be Join the Ranks. 4 should be Swords to Plowshares (or Path to Exile). Then add 4 counterspells. Negate would work. Counterspell would work. Cryptic Command would most definately work.
You may also try 23 lands and 15 other spells. I'm not sure if this will work or not, but at least it's worth a try. Then you may try playing 5 counterspells instead of 4. Those can be 2 Cryptic Command for late turns and 3 Negate for earlier turns. Or 2 Cryptic Command, 2 Negate (or Remove Soul, or Counterspell etc...) and 1 Pact of Negation.
Alternatively you may try 3x Talus Paladin, 3x Hada Freeblade and thus play 22 creatures. You may even try 3x Kazandu Blademasters making your creature count 21. Those 3 slots you can use for more counterspells or for removal.
But whichever counterspells you choose to use, make sure that Cryptic Command is one of them.
Let's try this version and see how it performs.
LE
WOW! I am not kidding, in my company similar tirade resulted in mandatory mental health check of the employee. The poor guy ended up, you know where. Relax man, I can say for myself that I mostly love your articles. Just be at peace with yourself that you are doing public business and you are subject to public opinion.
Oddly enough, the deck I played had little connection to the wrath and reanimate build I made for that article. The decks share twelve creatures, twelve lands and a creature type, but whereas the previous deck tried to get clever with reanimation, this was straightforward high octane acceleration. The two decks play very differently.
As for why your deck didn't quite make it, if I had to put my finger anywhere, I'd say interactivity. No sweepers, 4 cards capable of dealing with a single creature (8 if you count Rite to kill legends or invoke clever shenanigans on an opponent's creature), it basically attempts to do its thing regardless of what the opponent is doing. Evolver's elves get away with that because it is possible for them to overwhelm other opposition before they hit their wrath effects, monocolor lending them phenomenal speed when coupled with one of the three most synergetic tribes in the game.
The rest, however, dedicate a lot of slots to dealing with the opponent's creations. Winter.Wolf, 8 sweepers of which 6 one-sided, plus Mangara and the means to recur him. Me, 8 sweepers plus 8 mass edict effects, consecutive or concurrent. Proclaim, 12 single target removal of which 2 repeatable, 2 pyroclasm. Shuyin, 2 sweepers, 4 edicts and 4 deathtouch fliers, plus the power of bombardment coupled with his bloodghasts. Unless you can overwhelm your opponent, there's every chance they can rip your deck apart whilst you can at best mildly inconvenience them or oppose with five of their best creature. Your deck relies on achieving a critical mass of allies in play, so you can see why a sweeper heavy environment might cause problems.
How to fix it? Keep doing what you're doing. Innovate. Experiment. Analyse the potential metagame and make sure you can meet and match the worst it can throw at you. You will lose, you will fall short, you'll come up against decks that perfectly answer your strategy, and all that doesn't matter and is largely out of your control, because one week you will be the perfect answer to everyone elses' strategy. Meet with triumph and disaster, treat them both the same.
For an article with the title "Basics of Drafting" you seem to have a lot of disdain for casual and/or inexperienced drafters. Aren't they your target audience? Claiming that "idiots" all of a sudden means "tired and distracted" is a pretty weak defense, and then to come back on later and go on a tirade just made it worse. You should have just admitted you make a poor choice of words and left it at that.
lol, wasn't even thinking about Quicksand, I was thinking primarily of turning on landfall on Searing Blaze, etc. Odd I completely missed that.
The problem with the piece isn't that it was swiss or that you called your opponents idiots due to poor plays, its that it doesn't do what its stated aim was which was to show the power of cutting a color. The sixth pick hideous end in the first pack shows that no one was playing black. You could make the argument that no one changed over to black because you were cutting it but its difficult to really say so one way or the other. After that, the match reports are boring because your deck is so strong so it ends up being a poor piece of writing of little strategic value. I think that's all that people were trying to say. I'm sorry if you got offended but I believe your response crosses the line and makes you look bad and supremely arrogant (so you wrote a bad piece. no big deal. it happens. no need to defend yourself and snap. you've written great pieces before and you'll do it again) where beforehand it looked like they were in the wrong.
I mean, Pete, lets be serious here. You may have been writing articles for 11 years, but you write for EVERYONE.
A) This is poor editing on PureMTGO's part. I would have never let an article pass if it called potential readers "idiots" or "mentally retarded" even if they truly were.
B) Your reaction is even MORE out of line, you blatantly buy into what the trolls want. Have you not been on the internet for more than 2 years? This happens all the time.
C) Swiss draft? Really? You get paid enough to pay for a draft set(from what I know about what pure pays), why not risk it in 8-4?
This^^^ Just Yes! Unfortunately there is no way to remove anonymous from these boards unless puremtgo adopted an Identification policy similar to other sites where you have to use your MTGO ID and confirm it online before being allowed to post.
Planeswalkers have made more than 5 showings in 2009- heck im sure yam lampron(creator of ultimatewalker, has a thread on deck on the source) has more than 4-5 top 8's in 09 with it.
A lot of the decks were old and not played anymore like: Alluren,uw control is obseleted by uw tempo, Astral Slide can only be piloted by the 1 n only morgan coke.
Red Death is a really fun deck sometimes and usually packs D.Rituals to power out helmline or sides it in.
then what the f^%&^K are you doing wasting time reading it, or bothering to write a post? Get a life.
28 comments so far, and the amount of vitriol is amazing. What the hell did I ever do to you people?
I have now been writing Magic articles for just a bit under 11 years. In all that time, I have had maybe three sets of feedback that have made me really think "f*ck this, life's too short." This is one.
I'm not a pro. Never claimed to be. I'm not a limited expert, and have often said that I'm not. I'm just a writer. It takes hours to get an article together, and the amount I get paid is about half minimum wage in my state. I can make a whole lot more per hour building furniture. However, I, like most of us writers, write because I want to share stories and maybe teach a little something. We writers are trying to contribute a little something to the community, etc. We do what we can because we can. Why do you feel a need to piss on that?
Mr Anonymous, what single useful, productive, meaningful thing have you done in your entire wretched little life to justify yourself? I have to say that I have never heard of you doing anything. Is your entire purpose in life simply to spread the misery or your empty, meaningless existence to everyone you can? Well, f#$%@k you, you've succeeded. Right now, I'm hurt and pissed, and if any of you would care to come to my house, I would be more than happy to see if I really can literally beat the crap out of someone. I would love to try.
Yes, I know, I'm pissing back at anonymous shits on the Internet. I'm mad enough that I don't care how futile and pointless that is.
And as for that last poster - at the moment, at least - I don't have to log on anonymously to post in my own defense. I do so under my own name, and what's more, I even know what the shift key does, you moldy little rat turd. Christ, you don't even know that raredrafters mainly hit the 8-4 queues. That's the best place to score a pile of rares...
Yes, I know how pointless this is, but I need to spew a little hatred, bitterness and venom right now, because I am pretty full of it. Maybe this is therapeutic. Maybe this will post will be deleted by JXC. And maybe I should go to bed and dream pleasant little dreams. Dreams like: "Hello Mr. Baseball Bat. Hello Mr. Kneecap belonging to A. Nony. Mous. So glad you two could meet."
To all of you who put their names to the feedback, thank you for your comments. Even when they are negative, they can at least help me - and other writers - get a little better.
To those of you who did not see fit to include your name, f@ck you.
PRJ
I don't see any Imperial Recruiter in your Aluren decklist.
This of course makes the Aluren + Imperial Recruiter combo much harder to pull off. :)
"As you can see this deck is focused on using Contamination in order to ramp mana and make things happen."
How does the B control deck ramp with Contamination? With one in play, your swamps just produce B. No ramping involved.
whoa, this was a swiss draft? ive said it be4 and i say it again, you cant learn anything from swiss drafting. the people who swiss are out of their minds and cannot justify picks. usually its 2 qp sharks and 6 rare drafters. oy! i was unmoved when i saw the 'cutting' ability, but now its just a WOW moment in magic draft capture.
oh, and im pretty sure that comment from anon defending this guy is this guy, just saying
I think that anyone who's being critical for the article referring to the opponents as idiots isn't being honest with themselves. I understand playing paper magic where your opponent is sitting right there in front of you, but online, I wager that everyone who sees blatant misplays or bad picks isn't giving their esteemed, faceless opponents the allowance of a politically correct designation in their internal monologues.
Chill, guys.
This draft was a swiss or..?
Agree with 3rd comment but I may add in ZZW draft I really wouldn't recommend mono white as well. It just doesn't seem to work