General Magic Thread

Um, both Suicide Black *and* Stompy Green are expressly Ameritrash.

I'm thinking Blue decks...well, the non-Merfolk kind. Those are definitely Eurogamer material.

Malygris wrote: I probably should have mentioned before that these were usually multiplayer games, not one-on-one. Maybe what I'm talking about makes more sense now. Or maybe my friends and I just played Magic differently from most people.

Here's an example of one of my decks: The Land Deck.

4x Exploration
4x Manabond
2x Life From the Loam
1x Crop Rotation

4x Treetop Village
4x Mishra's Factory
4x Mutavault
4x Vesuva
1x Dark Depths
4x Maze of Ith
2x Island of Wak-Wak
4x Deserted Temple
4x Keldon Megaliths
1x Shivan Gorge
1x Dark Depths
1x The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale
1x Karakas
1x Strip Mine
2x Wasteland
4x Taiga
4x Stomping Ground
4x Forest

It rarely won, except in team games. It was a lot of fun to build and play.

That's pretty close to a well-known top-tier Legacy deck! Karakas should deal with both of the nasty creatures you mentioned (and, for people who haven't played the deck, is semi-tutorable with Life from the Loam). No idea how it'd do in multiplayer, though. BTW, if you still have the deck: check out Thespian's Stage. It combos quite nicely with Dark Depths

BTW: lol @ the person complaining about overpowered creatures winning with a 20/20 flying indestructible creature

Ken B. wrote: Um, both Suicide Black *and* Stompy Green are expressly Ameritrash.

I'm thinking Blue decks...well, the non-Merfolk kind. Those are definitely Eurogamer material.

You actually just died to me. There is definitely, DEFINITELY, no more fun color in Magic than blue. Black is a close second, green a distant third.

dragonstout wrote:

Ken B. wrote: Um, both Suicide Black *and* Stompy Green are expressly Ameritrash.

I'm thinking Blue decks...well, the non-Merfolk kind. Those are definitely Eurogamer material.

You actually just died to me. There is definitely, DEFINITELY, no more fun color in Magic than blue. Black is a close second, green a distant third.

No way, man...Blue is the "color they gave every fucking thing to ever in the old days" color. Need counterspells? How about FREE Counterspells? How about REPEATABLE counterspells? Bounce? Efficient creatures? Free turns? Card draw? Board control?

Fuck Blue right in its stupid asshole. Unless its like Illusions.dec, which is a derpy fun deck I can get behind.

Ken B. wrote: No way, man...Blue is the "color they gave every fucking thing to ever in the old days" color. Need counterspells? How about FREE Counterspells? How about REPEATABLE counterspells? Bounce? Efficient creatures? Free turns? Card draw? Board control?

Fuck Blue right in its stupid asshole. Unless its like Illusions.dec, which is a derpy fun deck I can get behind.

:'-[

Now your anti-Eternal, pro-Standard stance all makes a lot more sense to me.

Of course I'd love it if the colors were more balanced in eternal play. But yeah, I think blue is most fun to play BOTH in Legacy (yes, largely due to all the crazy overpowered shit) AND in Limited. I even say this as someone who was just crushed the other day in Cube thanks to Timetwister, Upheaval, and Vedalken Shackles. But I'll be damned if they weren't FUN games (I got to cast Mind Twist three times in one game)!

U 4 LIFE

dragonstout wrote: Now your anti-Eternal, pro-Standard stance all makes a lot more sense to me.

Dude, when a card is better in the format for being even just part blue (for Force of Will), you know something is totally fucked up, man.

It's funny to me because in Modern, Jund had their Bloodbraid Elf banned. Yeah, he did some crazy stuff, but nowhere near the same power level as the old blue cards. So honestly, yeah, Modern is about as far back as I will ever go in terms of Eternal formats.

I just want to repeatedly pimp slap every little fuckhead I've played over the years who says, "No" when you play a spell and then has this little smirk on their face. SMACK. SLAP. BEATINGS.

Reading Standard articles feels me with sadistic glee because of the inevitable whining from control players about how much more difficult it is to play pure control these days.

To which I say....GOOD. )

Pure control is miserable. It does barely exist in Legacy, though; it's much, MUCH more common to see aggro-control with Delvers and such, and as far as I'm concerned, that kind of deck is fun. But every once in a while I'd run into a Standstill-filled, Pernicious Deed-filled, counterspell-filled, win-with-Mishra's-Factory deck and cry.

I also love prison-style control decks (a la Enchantress in Legacy), though, so maybe I'm a little bit of a hypocrite.

The most dominant pure control deck of recent times, Legacy or Vintage or Modern or Standard, was Caw-Blade in Standard. Maybe the most dominant control deck since The Deck back in the old old days!

I love playing control in Limited, though, more than any other type of deck. I love how ramshackle it is, and it tends to work via different cards than just counterspells.

dragonstout wrote: That's pretty close to a well-known top-tier Legacy deck! Karakas should deal with both of the nasty creatures you mentioned (and, for people who haven't played the deck, is semi-tutorable with Life from the Loam). No idea how it'd do in multiplayer, though. BTW, if you still have the deck: check out Thespian's Stage. It combos quite nicely with Dark Depths

BTW: lol @ the person complaining about overpowered creatures winning with a 20/20 flying indestructible creature

That's interesting, I'd never heard of any other deck like it before. Except for one... Back in 1995, someone told me he played the national champion of Denmark at GenCon. He claimed the champion's deck was nothing but lands and Dakkon Blackblade. That was a running joke for a little while, and inspired me to build the deck.

Regarding Dark Depths: Yeah, I know, but there's only one in there and it takes thirty mana to use. I didn't win with it much. Usually I'd try to do early damage with Factories until they had blockers, then ping them with Keldon Monoliths.

Ken B. wrote: Um, both Suicide Black *and* Stompy Green are expressly Ameritrash.

I'm thinking Blue decks...well, the non-Merfolk kind. Those are definitely Eurogamer material.

I was just being a smartass -- sorry for the tone didn't shine through.

Malygris wrote:

dragonstout wrote: That's pretty close to a well-known top-tier Legacy deck! Karakas should deal with both of the nasty creatures you mentioned (and, for people who haven't played the deck, is semi-tutorable with Life from the Loam). No idea how it'd do in multiplayer, though. BTW, if you still have the deck: check out Thespian's Stage. It combos quite nicely with Dark Depths

BTW: lol @ the person complaining about overpowered creatures winning with a 20/20 flying indestructible creature

That's interesting, I'd never heard of any other deck like it before. Except for one... Back in 1995, someone told me he played the national champion of Denmark at GenCon. He claimed the champion's deck was nothing but lands and Dakkon Blackblade. That was a running joke for a little while, and inspired me to build the deck.

Regarding Dark Depths: Yeah, I know, but there's only one in there and it takes thirty mana to use. I didn't win with it much. Usually I'd try to do early damage with Factories until they had blockers, then ping them with Keldon Monoliths.

I was kidding about the big-creature thing

Yeah, the point of using Thespian's Stage with Dark Depths is that it DOESN'T take 30 mana to use. Takes...about 3!

Yeah, it's actually more than a top-tier Legacy deck; for a while a few years back it was considered by some to be THE best Legacy deck. There were believed to be two main reasons why it still only rarely showed up: 1) it wins very slowly, so slowly that in tournaments it'd go to time 2) it's very expensive, with Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale being the most blatant case.

Here's a decklist from 2010:
www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.a...x=mtg/daily/deck/412
and 2012:
www.starcitygames.com/article/24762_Land...Top-Of-The-Loam.html
and that 2012 player again made top8 June 2013 (though not 1st):
sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/di...eck.php?DeckID=56676

There are lots more, that was just from some lazy google searching.

Here's a fun article to read for *anybody*, which also includes the Lands deck as one of the "Ten Coolest Decks in Legacy's History":
www.starcitygames.com/article/23401_The-...egacy-s-History.html

Heh -- I have a land deck like that too that I built for casual play with a buddy. I had no idea it was a Top Tier Legacy deck. I'll post the list later tonight.

That's a good article and it illustrates how different Magic is in high level play than in casual play. There is no way in hell my friends and I would know how to abuse the stack and every possible trigger the way these guys do. Nor would we ever want to. I mean good lord turn two or turn three wins. blech. And we're not exactly Bad at Magic (clearly we're not Good either, but we're at least Decent).

Two of my favorite parts:
The guy who didn't know how to win with his own deck because everyone just conceded as soon as he showed the combo.
Step 4: Play (card #1). In response to the trigger, return (card #2) from the graveyard to play. Call the judge because your opponent will not believe that's how (card #1) works even though that's what it says.

iguanaDitty wrote: That's a good article and it illustrates how different Magic is in high level play than in casual play. There is no way in hell my friends and I would know how to abuse the stack and every possible trigger the way these guys do. Nor would we ever want to. I mean good lord turn two or turn three wins. blech. And we're not exactly Bad at Magic (clearly we're not Good either, but we're at least Decent).

Just to clarify something, though: the #1, 2, and 5 decks in that article are no longer legal due to bannings, and #8 is no longer legal due to change in rules (though a fairly similar version is indeed still legal and awesome). That #1 deck, "Hulk Flash", is notoriously the most powerful deck in ANY format of all time (relative to the format). I believe the Vintage version had a decent chance of winning turn 0, during the opponent's upkeep, basically before they took their turn.

dragonstout wrote:

iguanaDitty wrote: That's a good article and it illustrates how different Magic is in high level play than in casual play. There is no way in hell my friends and I would know how to abuse the stack and every possible trigger the way these guys do. Nor would we ever want to. I mean good lord turn two or turn three wins. blech. And we're not exactly Bad at Magic (clearly we're not Good either, but we're at least Decent).

Just to clarify something, though: the #1, 2, and 5 decks in that article are no longer legal due to bannings, and #8 is no longer legal due to change in rules (though a fairly similar version is indeed still legal and awesome). That #1 deck, "Hulk Flash", is notoriously the most powerful deck in ANY format of all time (relative to the format). I believe the Vintage version had a decent chance of winning turn 0, during the opponent's upkeep, basically before they took their turn.

This is all fair enough, but it remains true that guys like Pat Chapin are constantly trying to create decks like this and know how to completely manipulate triggers like that.

Here is my Land Deck:

4 x Life from the Loam
4 x Manabond
Genju of the Realm
4 x Intuition
4 x Exploration

Crucible of Worlds
Nevinyrral's Disk
2 x Mox Diamond
Engineered Explosives

3 x Tropical Island
Savannah
4 x Wasteland
Academy Ruins
Forest
3 x Tolaria West
2 x Wooded Foothills
2 x Windswept Heath
2 x Vesuva
4 x Rishadan Port
3 x Maze of Ith
3 x Tranquil Thicket
4 x Mishra's Factory
Dark Depths
Cephalid Coliseum
Glacial Chasm
Horizon Canopy
Bojuka Bg

iguanaDitty wrote:

dragonstout wrote:

iguanaDitty wrote: That's a good article and it illustrates how different Magic is in high level play than in casual play. There is no way in hell my friends and I would know how to abuse the stack and every possible trigger the way these guys do. Nor would we ever want to. I mean good lord turn two or turn three wins. blech. And we're not exactly Bad at Magic (clearly we're not Good either, but we're at least Decent).

Just to clarify something, though: the #1, 2, and 5 decks in that article are no longer legal due to bannings, and #8 is no longer legal due to change in rules (though a fairly similar version is indeed still legal and awesome). That #1 deck, "Hulk Flash", is notoriously the most powerful deck in ANY format of all time (relative to the format). I believe the Vintage version had a decent chance of winning turn 0, during the opponent's upkeep, basically before they took their turn.

This is all fair enough, but it remains true that guys like Pat Chapin are constantly trying to create decks like this and know how to completely manipulate triggers like that.

Pat Chapin is one of my three favorite Magic players, easy (the other two are Luis Scott-Vargas and Stephen Menendian; all three of them I'm rating based on their personality and what they contribute to the game and its community, more than their actual play). His enthusiasm and love for the game is so palpable, and his eagerness to SPREAD that enthusiasm and love even moreso. He's optimistic and creative, always ready to explore new cards.