i've been pretty bad with it...winrate around 50%, winding up with a lot of heavy blue decks that have a lot of bounce and scry but no solid creature base. so basically my games have been me getting to turn 12, running out of stuff, and losing because I have no creature base - Sea God's Revenge doesn't do much when all you have are Omenspeakers on the board. Believe it or not green with its 9th pick Nissan Couriers and Time to Feeds is the only way I've had any success here.
that said I really dig the draft format. the decision to move clean, efficient removal out of common (and uncommon, come to think of it!) really makes a big difference. you can spend 12 mana total on a monster snake and know there are only a few cards at common and uncommon that will take care of it. the only unconditional kill spell at common costs 6! (and is very playable, too!) There doesn't seem to be any consensus first picks here - Lightning Strike seems like maybe the best common, but the other common removal is nowhere near as good, even Lash of the Whip (2nd best common removal spell?) is 5 mana. Wingsteed Rider is quite good. Griptide too.
― frogbs, Monday, 14 October 2013 20:22 (ten years ago) link
yeah best commons are strike, voyages end, griptide, rider, asp, nimbus. that's roughly the order I'd first pick them.
― iatee, Monday, 14 October 2013 22:56 (ten years ago) link
i dont think green's that bad, if it's the weakest color it's only by a tiny bit. i had a good one earlier but it had polukranos, boon satyr, and arbor colossus so yeah not the most representative of the color maybe
― ciderpress, Monday, 14 October 2013 23:26 (ten years ago) link
Lamp have you played any standard yet? i'm struggling to find a deck i enjoy that doesn't get crushed by red aggro or the Thassa deck which seem to be the main things you have to beat right now
― ciderpress, Monday, 14 October 2013 23:30 (ten years ago) link
Gray Merchant deserves a spot on that list IMO
― frogbs, Tuesday, 15 October 2013 00:29 (ten years ago) link
man people are really devoted to that guy but I think he's mediocre 75% of the decks he's in
― iatee, Tuesday, 15 October 2013 01:36 (ten years ago) link
i played a bunch pre-pt with some people here to test and i finished X-1 in a small cash tournament w/something that looked a lot like the orzhov midrange deck chapin and reitzel played at the pt this weekend. i had been playing around with a few different whip decks on mtgo and have had some success with golgari graveyard which played 7 enablers and lotleth trolls in order to fill the graveyard and a bunch of strong value creatures in g/b plus some removal. abrupt decay seems really good rn and it has a decent match-up against supreme verdict decks. the thassa deck wasn't really a thing yet though so i don't know how good yr devotion match-ups are? like, you have game against red for sure and i think scavenging ooze is actually p good against them but the blue decks require more removal than i was running and can probably just get ahead and sit on stuff while your answers are spread a little thin
― Lamp, Tuesday, 15 October 2013 02:37 (ten years ago) link
having your removal spell in hand be abrupt decay when they play a master of waves for 4 or 5 is pretty miserable i can tell you that
― ciderpress, Tuesday, 15 October 2013 02:56 (ten years ago) link
had a goofy old pack chaos draft last night w/ my friends and opened a wasteland
― iatee, Wednesday, 16 October 2013 13:50 (ten years ago) link
Finally got the R/U deck to work. Having 13 creatures definitely helped. Spellheart Chimera + Steam Augury was such a cool combo (or at least, it wound up being one). Still went 2-1 because of a nuts UW heroic deck (which I'm convinced is the best deck in the format) but at least it was fun to play!
― frogbs, Wednesday, 16 October 2013 19:24 (ten years ago) link
http://puremtgo.com/articles/ars-arcanum-theros-draft-overview
basically agree with this though I don't think 'black devotion' can really be drafted reliably enough to be considered an archetype. any deck that relies on drafting multiple copies of a single card is more of a gimmick deck than a format staple.
― iatee, Thursday, 17 October 2013 14:15 (ten years ago) link
note that he avoids mentioning that all his predictions were wrong
― iatee, Thursday, 17 October 2013 14:16 (ten years ago) link
there really aren't many good two-drop commons in this format are there? the 2/2 1G reach bestow guy maybe, Vaporkin...what else?
― frogbs, Thursday, 17 October 2013 15:13 (ten years ago) link
voyaging satyr, returned phalanx, baleful eidolon, leonin snarecaster, omenspeaker are all good though nothing's an auto-include really other than maybe leafcrown dryad
― ciderpress, Thursday, 17 October 2013 15:28 (ten years ago) link
is arena athlete an uncommon? i really like that guy
― Lamp, Thursday, 17 October 2013 15:30 (ten years ago) link
yeah thats unc
really surprised at the winrate chart since many people seem to think that UR is the weakest blue deck and even the weakest pair overall
― ciderpress, Thursday, 17 October 2013 15:31 (ten years ago) link
haha early on i was trying to convince iatee that u/r spells was the best archetype in theros. i am currently 22-5 drafting theros on mtgo and i was playing a lot of u/r. i think his point that it was just reasonably open compared to other stuff feels true, i was getting really solid red cards 8-10th. i often played 16 lands 10 creature decks in u/r stuff like form on the adept, lots of good twos to target with ordeals, great tempo.
― Lamp, Thursday, 17 October 2013 15:38 (ten years ago) link
u/r is great so long as you get enough creatures
― frogbs, Thursday, 17 October 2013 16:13 (ten years ago) link
you dont need that many creatures if your spells are good
― ciderpress, Thursday, 17 October 2013 17:32 (ten years ago) link
well. the way I see it having a bunch of bounce and low-level creature kill (stuff that kills small dudes but not fatties) will definitely help prolong the game but you still need your own dudes, particularly ones that don't die to most common removal. if you don't have that you just wind up waiting for your opponent to play the threat you can't kill.
― frogbs, Thursday, 17 October 2013 17:45 (ten years ago) link
never thought i'd be caught dead playing mono-black in standard, but had some success with it in testing last night and chaining gray merchants in constructed is pretty fun
― ciderpress, Friday, 18 October 2013 14:33 (ten years ago) link
I've been toying with this too, but I can't quite bring myself to ditching my green and red spells. My deck right now is more black devotion lite.
― Moodles, Friday, 18 October 2013 15:46 (ten years ago) link
http://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/205992
^ cool standard deck imo
― Lamp, Friday, 18 October 2013 16:21 (ten years ago) link
Surprised they didn't find a way to include Chained to the Rock in there
― frogbs, Friday, 18 October 2013 16:30 (ten years ago) link
i tested that white weenie deck, its definitely my style but is a bit rough vs the devotion decks that can flood the board pretty fast
― ciderpress, Friday, 18 October 2013 16:47 (ten years ago) link
here's a good (& pretty cheap) RDW deck i've been playing:
4 rakdos cackler4 burning-tree emissary4 firefist striker4 ash zealot4 chandra's phoenix4 boros reckoner4 fanatic of mogis
4 lightning strike4 magma jet3 shock
21 mountain
sideboard:1 hammer of purphoros2 skullcrack2 chandra, pyromaster3 mizzium mortars4 frostburn weird3 ratchet bomb
― ciderpress, Tuesday, 22 October 2013 03:00 (ten years ago) link
i have no idea what's good in standard but that looks pretty solid, makes me glad that CoP: Red has been out of standard for a long time
― frogbs, Tuesday, 22 October 2013 13:25 (ten years ago) link
cider i saw you 4-0'd with that - what do you think of the (pricier) chandra red deck?
― Lamp, Tuesday, 22 October 2013 17:46 (ten years ago) link
What kind of prize support do your local shops have for events?
Had a FB complaint about the prize support for Theros Game Day on Saturday, turns out my manager didn't give out anything but a Theros game pad and some foil packs and thinks that was fine. So I'm going to have to set up a prize system for Friday Night Magic and game days, I guess, but I don't know shit about Magic.
― Kiarostami bag (milo z), Tuesday, 22 October 2013 18:05 (ten years ago) link
for a traditional 8 man draft, mine does 6-4-3-3 packs for 1/2/3/4, the hipster wburg one I go to once in a blue moon does 8-4-2-2. those are both probably 'fair' and mirror the online draft payout, though the second one is less egalitarian and not necessarily good for morale for new players. I wish mine did store credit.
― iatee, Tuesday, 22 October 2013 18:15 (ten years ago) link
milo for a constructed tournament like game day the players should only be getting prizes if they're paying to enter the tournament. the only official prize support from wizards for game day are the promo cards and the play mat. there are a bunch of ways to organize prize structure for small shop tournaments like fnm and game day most of which involve some trade-offs, i think mostly a store just needs to have a clear, consistent policy. if your shop has a bunch of regulars for stuff like fnm i would talk to them and see sort of prize structure they're interested in
― Lamp, Tuesday, 22 October 2013 18:32 (ten years ago) link
fwiw the game day i played in was $5 to enter. all that money went into the prize pool, everyone that plays gets a promo cards, top 8 got another foil promo card. the winner got a playmat. the prize money was split btw the top 8 players not actually sure how the breakdown worked % wise but i got ~30% of the pool for splitting the finals
― Lamp, Tuesday, 22 October 2013 18:35 (ten years ago) link
the store i play at has a pretty basic setup for FNM that works well for everyone as far as i know:
standard constructed - $5 entry fee, a fixed 4 swiss rounds of play regardless of attendance, pay out store credit prizes by record to everyone with a 3-1 record or better, in a way such that you pay out most of the entry money
booster draft - $15 entry fee, form 8-man pods, draft and play 3 rounds swiss, pay out store credit $25 to 1st place and $15 to 2nd place in each draft pod
for larger events with a top 8 cut to elimination rounds like Game Day you have to improvise a bit more with the payouts but its still $5 entry per player for constructed and the prize pool is still about $5 per player
― ciderpress, Tuesday, 22 October 2013 21:17 (ten years ago) link
cider i saw you 4-0'd with that - what do you think of the (pricier) chandra red deck?― Lamp, Tuesday, October 22, 2013 1:46 PM (3 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
― Lamp, Tuesday, October 22, 2013 1:46 PM (3 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
― ciderpress, Tuesday, 22 October 2013 21:18 (ten years ago) link
2 Boros Guildgate13 Mountain2 Mutavault4 Sacred Foundry4 Temple of Triumph25 lands
4 Ash Zealot4 Boros Reckoner4 Chandra's Phoenix4 Stormbreath Dragon16 creatures
2 Chained to the Rocks3 Chandra, Pyromaster3 Lightning Strike4 Magma Jet2 Mizzium Mortars3 Shock2 Warleader's Helix19 other spells
Sideboard3 Anger of the Gods1 Assemble the Legion2 Chained to the Rocks1 Hammer of Purphoros1 Mizzium Mortars2 Pithing Needle2 Ratchet Bomb1 Shock2 Wear // Tear15 sideboard cards
ive seen versions that cut the ash zealots for even more burn which seems p good. i've been thinking about red because of all the monoblack decks that ive been playing against and i have all the cards for this except the dragons
― Lamp, Wednesday, 23 October 2013 02:36 (ten years ago) link
ok yeah i've seen that one floating around and i think ash zealot is probably bad there
i would rather play reynad's naya deck if i'm going to play a red control deck, i think it looks better than this one. either way i think you want more than 1 assemble the legion in the 75 since black can't interact with that at all
― ciderpress, Wednesday, 23 October 2013 13:31 (ten years ago) link
Theros prices seem pretty deflated on MTGO now, any idea what to pick up? Chained to the Rock at one ticket apiece seems like a good deal...
― frogbs, Wednesday, 23 October 2013 13:55 (ten years ago) link
steam augury at 11 cents seems like a freeroll to me
― ciderpress, Wednesday, 23 October 2013 13:58 (ten years ago) link
yeah I saw that too - I mean it's not FoF but it compares well enough that I think it'll find a home someday. actually MTGOTraders has it at 6 cents...even better
other potential good values:Anger of the Gods = $1.36 - could be a t2 staple?Chained to the Rocks - only $.70 nowFiredrinker Satyr - $.27 ...could Modern use this?Fleecemane Lion - $.81Nighthowler - $.05 - seems like it's really well costed, I always thought it was the best of the Bestow dudes
― frogbs, Wednesday, 23 October 2013 14:04 (ten years ago) link
also reaper of the wilds is a good card thats already seen some standard play but suffers from missing its dual land still
― ciderpress, Wednesday, 23 October 2013 14:06 (ten years ago) link
i don't remember slagstorm ever being more than a couple tix so i don't know how much room anger of the gods has to grow. chained to the rocks is good but the most comparable card, detention sphere, has been <1 ticket for a long time.
firedrinker satyr is not very good but maybe should be worth more just from being a 1-drop for rdw. def not modern playable if the superior rakdos cackler doesn't cut it there. i'm not that high on lion.
― ciderpress, Wednesday, 23 October 2013 14:12 (ten years ago) link
oh also prophet of kruphix is awesome and should be worth something eventually even if it doesn't stick in a standard deck
― ciderpress, Wednesday, 23 October 2013 14:14 (ten years ago) link
i would rather play reynad's naya deck if i'm going to play a red control deck, i think it looks better than this one
idk he has approximately 34 planeswalker cards in there for some reason none of which seem to compliment each other and the mana looks pretty terrible. fwiw i am completely willing to be wrong abt this and loxodon smiter seems like kind of a sweet card to be playing but i prefer the boros lists. there have been a couple of cleaner 4-0 lists in the last couple of days that added elspeth and i think its a deck to watch
i bought swan songs on mtgo on the chance that its an important sideboard card in eternal match-ups and its like ten cents or something. thats my speculation
― Lamp, Wednesday, 23 October 2013 14:22 (ten years ago) link
yeah thinking about it more i think its probably right to just play RW buti still don't like ash zealot unless you're running purphoros and/or nykthos
― ciderpress, Wednesday, 23 October 2013 14:54 (ten years ago) link
i also wish there was 1 more way to go deeper into your deck other than chandra + magma jet
― ciderpress, Wednesday, 23 October 2013 15:19 (ten years ago) link
haha me too. wish there was something of value to do w/wild guess other than run the not very good rn pyromancer
― Lamp, Wednesday, 23 October 2013 15:25 (ten years ago) link
purphomancer decks w/assemble just fold to like, everything though rn but man that feels sweet
― Lamp, Wednesday, 23 October 2013 15:26 (ten years ago) link
do any of you MTG nerds play on OCTGN?
― Mordy , Wednesday, 23 October 2013 18:24 (ten years ago) link
nope
cockatrice is the current standard for free MTG-ing, as far as i know. dont know anyone who still uses OCTGN
― ciderpress, Wednesday, 23 October 2013 19:07 (ten years ago) link
whoa
http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/other/10212013/vintagemasters
essentially power 9 cards are coming, but they're basically as rare as foil mythics, and the set itself is gonna be double MSRP. dunno how this is going to be much different than Masters Edition
― frogbs, Thursday, 24 October 2013 01:28 (ten years ago) link