I didn't miss any boat. Return to Zendikar without fetches is a "what's the point?" moment for Wizards. That's nothing new for them, though.
As soon as Return to Ravnica was announced, what did people expect? Shocklands.
As soon as Return to Zendikar was announced, what did people expect?
Fetchlands.
One of these is not like the other. One group of people was pleased while another group of people was severely disappointed.
Green is still fine against Delver. In fact Stompy is currently the third most played deck. The problem is not with Delver but Cloud of Faeries based combo.
You guys are missing the boat here. in recent blocks, WoTC likes to introduce mechanics with some pre-seeded support, allow that support to rotate out to prevent it dominating too much and then give it a final boost of support towards the end of its life in standard. Landfall will start the format with enemy coloured fetchlands to support it, those will rotate out when KTK and FRF leave the format (DTK will stay) and then they'll reprint the ally fetchlands in the final set that battle for zendikar is legal in. Bank on it.
I take it green's no longer playable in the format? Scattershot archers used to be a massive beating for faerie decks when stompy was a deck. Sideboard in four of those, combined with quirion ranger, and some number of hornet stings and delver/faerie strategies can never stick a threat. Hidden spider was also a fun metagame call.
Overall, I didn't do that badly, getting 6 of 13 cards unrevealed at that point correct, including the biggest hit of Iridescent Angel (though I didn't expect new art). We also see a lot of concepts I mentioned, including a range of costs (Jenara, Lightning Angel), new foils of Commander cards (Archangel of Strife, Tariel), and a range of colors (Jenara, Tariel). One thing that is surprising is that there are a lot of red angels, four in total. There's also the lack of truly-desirable cards outside of Avacyn, but that is appearing to be the trend for these sets.
I think it's a huge mistake to make a big deal out of "Return to Zendikar" and not reprint the fetches. Return to Ravnica wouldn't have been much without the shocklands.
My thinking is that in order to recapture the flavor and character of those previous sets you need a good number of reprints (not just the pricy lands).
We've been Wizarded...again.
2 dragonlord dromoka + 4 monastery mentor is probably sufficient for leap since leap only wants one creature at a time and you put the rest of the cards revealed on the bottom of your library.
I built a prototype for Standard (because I am not that fond of playing Modern on MTGO) that works alright:
3 Evolutionary Leap
4 Monastery Mentor
2 Dragonlord Dromoka
4 Myth Realized
4 End Hostilities
1 Revoke Existence
4 Raise the Alarm
2 Pillar of Light
2 Last Breath
2 Hallowed Moonlight
1 Reclamation Sage
4 Springleaf Drum
2 Astral Cornucopia
1 Dromoka Monument
1 Sword of the Animist
3 Windswept Heath
8 Plains
7 Forest
1 Haven of the Spirit Dragon
4 Blossoming Sands
With some tweaking and upgrading of cards I am sure this would be OK in Modern. Great? Probably not but OK and fun.
Id probably relegate the hallowed moonlightx2 to the sideboard, and replace the sword with an actual sword like F&F or F&I. Astral Cornucupia would become Lotus Bloom, Blossoming Sands obviously would be Temple Garden, End Hostilities would be Wrath or the like.
Those are some good ideas. I did think about token creation so we can sacrifice them for real creatures. I didn't think about it much further. The only problem with running Young Pyromancer and Monastery Mentor is finding the right balance between running enough to activate them and enough creatures/token generators to make playing Leap worthwhile.
I used $12 because that's what Wizards will be charging for other constructed Dailies. Also, what I can charge at a convention or store in Madison, which has 5 competing game stores running FM is different than what Wizards can charge on the one and only MTGO.
At that time I did. FNM was typically sealed deck. (Tournament Pack +2-3 packs of whatever was current.) But I tend to be a poor sealed deck builder. I Always feel like I could have built my deck better even when it wins. Which is not that often. Years later I did win a Mirrodin prerelease Sealed event somewhat randomly but that was a fluke and happened after not playing limited at all for a long time.
I wonder what the reaction would be if they ever released a set like that today? Every time folks complain about power creep, I think of Rise of the Eldrazi. I love when I get a chance to play with some of those cards and would definitely jump up and down for a flashback weekend.
Too bad there's only two stories here because those where two good ones. You get style points for a story about losing. Right up MY alley!
I love when a player wins with guile (not Guile) as well as good gameplay. The highly underrated aspect of play is being able to make your opponent think you have it, or conversely, you don't have it. I tend to play at one speed, so with me it's hard to tell. Every once in a while I make em sweat when I have nothing just to see if they'll buy what I'm selling, or I'll snap something off to make them think I'm about to play a trick.
It's cool that you got to do this in a pod with some seriously talented players. Always feels good to play well against the best. Even better winning against the best.
I'm already playing modern. Have my 4C Kiki deck. Love it. No one else is really playing it either so it's hecka fun to see the reaction when they find out there's no Black in it.
I don't even care for the Eidolons in Mono Red Standard. Most of the spells I cast at 3 cmc or lower, and many of the popular decks go over 4 cmc. Some don't even have 2 consistent 2 drops. If they were at a normal price point last week maybe I would have splurged. $25 a pop at that time. Not paying $100 for cards that will be worth $50 total post rotation. Especially cards I'm not 100% on board with.
But I can certainly see how folks would want to have them for sure. I'm just not too high on them.
From working in similar corporate structures I can say having parent company buy in on the strategy and providing funding is critical for success. That said the obvious limiting factor is the competency of the staff at WOTC. If their skill is the issue then nothing will help besides getting a new staff.
It was a big mistake not printing them in Modern Masters 2 (alongside stuff like Serum Visions, Inquisition, etc). However, I don't know how people expected them to reprint the Zendikar fetches right away, putting 10 fetchs in Standard. They can only be reprinted when the others rotate.
The fewer dailies that fire the better. WoTC has demonstrated that they are EXTREMELY data driven. The way to argue for change is to have the data to back it up. "Look these changes are awful; none of the dailies are firing because everyone is cashing out of the format."
It's good to know someone else is extremely disappointed in Legion Events not running a GP this year--I have no clue who will run the Minneapolis GP then, and my experiences with them have been great.
I didn't miss any boat. Return to Zendikar without fetches is a "what's the point?" moment for Wizards. That's nothing new for them, though.
As soon as Return to Ravnica was announced, what did people expect? Shocklands.
As soon as Return to Zendikar was announced, what did people expect?
Fetchlands.
One of these is not like the other. One group of people was pleased while another group of people was severely disappointed.
Green is still fine against Delver. In fact Stompy is currently the third most played deck. The problem is not with Delver but Cloud of Faeries based combo.
You guys are missing the boat here. in recent blocks, WoTC likes to introduce mechanics with some pre-seeded support, allow that support to rotate out to prevent it dominating too much and then give it a final boost of support towards the end of its life in standard. Landfall will start the format with enemy coloured fetchlands to support it, those will rotate out when KTK and FRF leave the format (DTK will stay) and then they'll reprint the ally fetchlands in the final set that battle for zendikar is legal in. Bank on it.
I take it green's no longer playable in the format? Scattershot archers used to be a massive beating for faerie decks when stompy was a deck. Sideboard in four of those, combined with quirion ranger, and some number of hornet stings and delver/faerie strategies can never stick a threat. Hidden spider was also a fun metagame call.
I've been running 3x gut shot main in my Delver deck, replaced piracy charm and I've been very happy with it.
Of course, the full card list for FTV: Angels would be published on the same day as my new article:
http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/feature/vault-angels-2015-0...
Overall, I didn't do that badly, getting 6 of 13 cards unrevealed at that point correct, including the biggest hit of Iridescent Angel (though I didn't expect new art). We also see a lot of concepts I mentioned, including a range of costs (Jenara, Lightning Angel), new foils of Commander cards (Archangel of Strife, Tariel), and a range of colors (Jenara, Tariel). One thing that is surprising is that there are a lot of red angels, four in total. There's also the lack of truly-desirable cards outside of Avacyn, but that is appearing to be the trend for these sets.
I think it's a huge mistake to make a big deal out of "Return to Zendikar" and not reprint the fetches. Return to Ravnica wouldn't have been much without the shocklands.
My thinking is that in order to recapture the flavor and character of those previous sets you need a good number of reprints (not just the pricy lands).
We've been Wizarded...again.
Checkout this thread about 64 players drafts: https://www.reddit.com/r/MTGO/comments/3gfw2s/64player_release_drafts_no...
It's yet another thing they reduced prizes and as a result lost players.
The 64 drafts should run all year, or at least Friday to Sunday with 3 or 4 hours in between them.
As of now they are part of the release events, which makes them only run for the first 3 weeks or so whenever a new set comes out.
Another work of art disguised as a Magic article :) Good show!
2 dragonlord dromoka + 4 monastery mentor is probably sufficient for leap since leap only wants one creature at a time and you put the rest of the cards revealed on the bottom of your library.
I built a prototype for Standard (because I am not that fond of playing Modern on MTGO) that works alright:
3 Evolutionary Leap
4 Monastery Mentor
2 Dragonlord Dromoka
4 Myth Realized
4 End Hostilities
1 Revoke Existence
4 Raise the Alarm
2 Pillar of Light
2 Last Breath
2 Hallowed Moonlight
1 Reclamation Sage
4 Springleaf Drum
2 Astral Cornucopia
1 Dromoka Monument
1 Sword of the Animist
3 Windswept Heath
8 Plains
7 Forest
1 Haven of the Spirit Dragon
4 Blossoming Sands
With some tweaking and upgrading of cards I am sure this would be OK in Modern. Great? Probably not but OK and fun.
Id probably relegate the hallowed moonlightx2 to the sideboard, and replace the sword with an actual sword like F&F or F&I. Astral Cornucupia would become Lotus Bloom, Blossoming Sands obviously would be Temple Garden, End Hostilities would be Wrath or the like.
Those are some good ideas. I did think about token creation so we can sacrifice them for real creatures. I didn't think about it much further. The only problem with running Young Pyromancer and Monastery Mentor is finding the right balance between running enough to activate them and enough creatures/token generators to make playing Leap worthwhile.
I used $12 because that's what Wizards will be charging for other constructed Dailies. Also, what I can charge at a convention or store in Madison, which has 5 competing game stores running FM is different than what Wizards can charge on the one and only MTGO.
At that time I did. FNM was typically sealed deck. (Tournament Pack +2-3 packs of whatever was current.) But I tend to be a poor sealed deck builder. I Always feel like I could have built my deck better even when it wins. Which is not that often. Years later I did win a Mirrodin prerelease Sealed event somewhat randomly but that was a fluke and happened after not playing limited at all for a long time.
I wonder what the reaction would be if they ever released a set like that today? Every time folks complain about power creep, I think of Rise of the Eldrazi. I love when I get a chance to play with some of those cards and would definitely jump up and down for a flashback weekend.
Too bad there's only two stories here because those where two good ones. You get style points for a story about losing. Right up MY alley!
Do you play any sealed? That's my next topic.
I love when a player wins with guile (not Guile) as well as good gameplay. The highly underrated aspect of play is being able to make your opponent think you have it, or conversely, you don't have it. I tend to play at one speed, so with me it's hard to tell. Every once in a while I make em sweat when I have nothing just to see if they'll buy what I'm selling, or I'll snap something off to make them think I'm about to play a trick.
It's cool that you got to do this in a pod with some seriously talented players. Always feels good to play well against the best. Even better winning against the best.
Kudos!
I'm already playing modern. Have my 4C Kiki deck. Love it. No one else is really playing it either so it's hecka fun to see the reaction when they find out there's no Black in it.
I don't even care for the Eidolons in Mono Red Standard. Most of the spells I cast at 3 cmc or lower, and many of the popular decks go over 4 cmc. Some don't even have 2 consistent 2 drops. If they were at a normal price point last week maybe I would have splurged. $25 a pop at that time. Not paying $100 for cards that will be worth $50 total post rotation. Especially cards I'm not 100% on board with.
But I can certainly see how folks would want to have them for sure. I'm just not too high on them.
TO me that seems like the very soul of an inside joke...
From working in similar corporate structures I can say having parent company buy in on the strategy and providing funding is critical for success. That said the obvious limiting factor is the competency of the staff at WOTC. If their skill is the issue then nothing will help besides getting a new staff.
It was a big mistake not printing them in Modern Masters 2 (alongside stuff like Serum Visions, Inquisition, etc). However, I don't know how people expected them to reprint the Zendikar fetches right away, putting 10 fetchs in Standard. They can only be reprinted when the others rotate.
No Zendikar fetchlands makes me very mad. They need to reprint them so modern is a viable format for the common player. Big mistake in my opinion.
That's actually a good point. I think the only fear is that they've flat out retired events before because they weren't firing.
Gold queues, Premier events, and I think there were more I'm not sure. I do hope that something is done, because it's clearly not a popular change.
Not really. When Andy was streaming someone asked him what his name was. Somebody else in the chat said it was Randy Tobasco.
The fewer dailies that fire the better. WoTC has demonstrated that they are EXTREMELY data driven. The way to argue for change is to have the data to back it up. "Look these changes are awful; none of the dailies are firing because everyone is cashing out of the format."
It's good to know someone else is extremely disappointed in Legion Events not running a GP this year--I have no clue who will run the Minneapolis GP then, and my experiences with them have been great.