MTG thread

Hoss said:

When you're building a deck, about how many of each type of card are you shooting for? By type, I mean, things like creatures, lands, spells, special lands, etc.

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You want enough lands to consistently cast your spells on curve, and to use your mana each turn efficiently. This can range anywhere from 15 to 25 depending on the deck, format, etc.

There are no "rules" about card types beyond that. You can mix and match whatever you want, provided that you have ways to play them. There are weird fringe decks that use very few or even zero lands, or don't even cast spells in order to win. The combination of cards just work, like Dredge, Belcher, etc.

Heylel said:

What region? I'll be staffing GP Atlanta in a few weeks.

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South east. I would rather play sealed than judge it. I live in the Huntsville Alabama to be specific.

Cud said:

South east. I would rather play sealed than judge it. I live in the Huntsville Alabama to be specific.

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I bet we've met then. I'm in Georgia. Hell we're probably in the same Slack chat right now.

a_skeleton_02 said:

Anyone here play competitive modern?

I wanna talk about competitive modern.

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i play merfolk or 8rack

IQs are the highest ive gone on the competitive side, I play Dredge, Living end, kiki Chord. Tooth and Nail. I am debating on GP indy this weekend but it's only 2 hours away from me but im not sure if im ready to jump in that deep yet.

Necrath Evilcraft said:

IQs are the highest ive gone on the competitive side, I play Dredge, Living end, kiki Chord. Tooth and Nail. I am debating on GP indy this weekend but it's only 2 hours away from me but im not sure if im ready to jump in that deep yet.

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If you want to split the difference, attend the GP and play side events. Early rounds of the main event aren't much different from an IQ, just larger. The sides are where it's at with a GP though. If you're not a top 64 player, your money is better spent there. Plus it gives you some scheduling flexibility. Winning a GP is a commitment of time and a test of endurance as much as your playing skill. I've seen quite a few players succumb to the late afternoon funk because they neglected to eat, or drink enough water.

fanaskin said:

I bought a set of grim flayers today to tryout when they come in, how is the new liliaina in modern? she's like 40 each now.

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No way she's worth that. Skip em until they're $20 or less.

As for modern, when I play that format it tends to be Collected Company. I used to play Pod, but it got banned. Then I played Twin, and it got banned. I skipped Amulet Bloom because I wasn't falling for it again. I own pretty much everything that isn't Jund, but usually flip around between Affinity, Abzan Company, or some random jank. Eventually I'll pick up goyfs and lillies again for Jund, but it's hard to justify the price tag on a reprintable card. In nearly all circumstances, I would rather buy an LED or a City of Traitors than a Tarmogoyf.

I don't really get the point of Death Shadow Aggro. It just seems like bad Infect to me. Yeah Brad got a turn 2 kill, but he also drew 3 probes and 2 street wraiths. Infect could have managed the same trick in fewer cards.

I mean, it seems like bad infect because they're the same basic deck. A creature based combo deck. They both have similar kill-turns, share some cards from iteration to iteration, and play out very similarly from the other side of the table. They have different sideboard plans available to them (although both possess the ability to move away from their combo-core to try to stabilize against interaction-heavy decks, Infect is much better suited to dealing with such opponents), and they kill with different named damage. They're both looking at a pretty stable turn 3 kill against a goldfish.

Infect gets ways of preventing/responding to interaction, Suicide Zoo says "fuck it, most of the best decks in the format have between 1-3 maindeck, up to 5 after sideboard, ways of interacting, I'm just going all in on free-cycle in those anti-interaction slots to increase consistency."

Infect is the better deck at beating prepared players, Suicide Zoo is the better deck at defeating bad hands/unprepared players.

Also, Suicide Zoo involves sacrificing a goat to the No Burn Decks pairing god before entering the event.

Suicide Zoo additionally enjoys popularity in online testing queues because it isn't a "solved" deck yet; it's still iterating and potentially getting stronger.

It is a super, super easy deck to fuck yourself on mulliganing with, though, due to those cyclers. See a lot of people pick it up to try it out and fall into the Living End deck trap of keeping shaky hands hoping cycling will take them to victory.

Finally, there are several pros who are very high on the deck, so people follow suite. Even if the same pros were convinced Evolutionary Leap Elves was going to need a modern ban...

Would anyone be interested in purchasing a large amount of Standard staples of all rarity and some nice stuff like Nahiri, Avacyn, Westvale, etc and tooons more?

Have a moderate amount of BfZ, OotGW, fuckloads of SoI and a small amount of EMN. Some good foils in the mix.

Strapped for cash so am willing to break apart most of my decks and sell all my nicest cards and playsets.

Send me a PM and I can give more specifics about what I have exactly and pricing but it will absolutely be a good deal/better than what you would pay normally.

edit: Looking for a bulk offload, not trying to just sell 1 or 3 good cards - sorry.

I wouldn't be shocked if Become Immense gets banned in modern with a year. It lets Deaths shadow agro be so much more busted and was a huge boon for infect.

Necrath Evilcraft said:

I wouldn't be shocked if Become Immense gets banned in modern with a year. It lets Deaths shadow agro be so much more busted and was a huge boon for infect.

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Delve is flat out broken. WotC got fooled by the absence of Tombstalker in modern because no one wants BB casting costs that don't say "Lilliana" in the name. Turns out there is a MASSIVE difference between Delving down to 2 mana vs 1 mana.

Interesting video from Alpha Investments (he's back btw)

Very little to do with magic, but he's spot on about credit cards. Provided that you're not using them to run a balance, you can make them work for you very well. I run all of my monthly expenses through my card and pay it off weekly.

Hoss said:

Why weekly? There's no reason to pay it off more often than monthly unless you have a shitty deal that starts charging interest after a week.

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Just discipline, really. It has become part of my weekly routine, and helps me to keep a better sense on what my spending looks like week to week. I have to log into my corporate Amex every week for expenses anyway, and it shows my personal card right there so I just go ahead and take care of it.