Journey Into Nyx Set Review: The Legends

Happy Tuesday Zoners!

UL's back with the Journey Into Nyx Set Review with the Legendary Creatures of the set. Though we only had 6, there's plenty to talk about.

So let's kick it off in spoiler reverse.

I'm not sure what the deal is with Pharika. It's clear to me that this card was designed bottoms up because this is not the flavor that has been outlined in the cards and surrounding literature concerning Theros and the Gods.

To be fair, I'm not sure what the flavor would look like for a Creature that's supposed to be both creator and healer for all the maladies of the plane, but this is not it, and Golgari players everywhere are now suffering. Snakes,  +1/+1 counters, or Jarad Buffs are too many choices, and though none of them are really better than the others, they aren't collectively good either.

Aside from being an aggressively-costed God, Pharika is terrible from about every perspective I can measure, and that's disappointing. I feel that in every set, Wizards takes one card in their cycle, and just tanks it on purpose. This is it.

Moving along in our Spoiler rewind motion, we've got Athreos, the God that got all the attention out of PAX East 2014.

I'm very put off by the artwork. With such an elegant card border, many of the Theros block Gods seem to be heightened by the re-framing.

However, our friend Athreos is clearly not, and the contrast is serious. In fact, I think it's just the whole color palette. I'm not sure what Ryan Barger thought or what he was instructed to do with the artwork, but I'm really feeling like I need to call into question what he thought "God of Passage" meant. The acrid yellow smoke off the water (DRNT-DRNT-DRRR, DRNT-DRNT-DURR-NURR) doesn't conjure up the idea that Athreos is a Charon allusion ferrying Theronians (Theronites?) across a comparable version of the river Styx, but really? A blindfolded piece of Nuclear-Flubber-turned-Grim-Reaper as he drags them through the remnants of what a toilet looks like after high school kids come back from their first night of drinking.

That sounds critical, but I'm not upset about the mechanical design of Athreos. I'm okay with it. However, I would've welcomed the inclusion of a boat. I just don't know how he plans on transporting anyone. I don't know anyone, living or dead, who'd happily grab on to his gross body, sit on top of a god's scythe when traversing to the afterlife.

As far as the rules go, I think it's going to be played, which is only a bummer cause I can't stand to look at it. The key to its success will be "target opponent." Picking out the lowest life total at the table will ensure that threats are coming back, and with access to all the Extort/Enchantment combos you want, this could be much more real than Obzedat, Teysa 2.0, and Triad of Fates, which we've seen for Black and White in the last year.

So we're moving from tangible and disgusting to the unseen and amorphous.

I'll admit I had the worst time trying to figure out if R&D made a mistake with Kruphix's 4th ability, consulting both GG and my playgroup's rules guru/almost Magic Judge.

It felt like an unemptying mana pool was implied, but not stated. On almost every card of its kind, Wizards has done a real "beat-me-over-the-head" job of explaining via reminder text that the mana doesn't empty from the mana pool as steps and phases end, like Omnath.

However, this is not Omnath at all. By being a replacement effect, Wizards has done a clever thing to make the design slightly more elegant while maintaining functionality. And, as I pointed out to GG, the lack of explanation adds to Kruphix's mystery. So at the very least, the designers are scoring points for flavor victories.

I didn't pick the order, but we've got back-to-back hits. Because I'm a huge fan of Keranos.

Though it is probably because of GG, I'm obligated to give two looks to any Magic card that says, "Draw a card." It's the three little words R&D could put on basically anything and I'd at least say, "Well... I'll try it."

Keranos, however, is a little more than that. Unlike Mogis's opt-sac/pitiful 2 damage, Theros' resident bolt-thrower is going to generate value for you no matter what's on the top of your library, which is also something that's within your control in these colors.

There are a lot of selling points for playing Keranos in Commander. He works well with Izzet's most recent additions (Niv-Mizzet Dracogenius and Melek), and he plays well with the bulky damage doubling enchantments that Red wants to play. You might even be able to play Creature-less with a nice control package.

This is a deck I hope to see around, mostly because I want to blast this whenever someone casts him.

And speaking of decks that will probably be rampant, we should all be giving a big kitchen table welcome to Iroas. Designed with such savory, intentional goodness, the new Red-White God of Victory seems to have been born with a gigantic ego and big-game abilities to match.

The first question I have to ask on Iroas is, "Where da Nyx?"

An overwhelming majority of the God artwork seems to carry that special midnight-sparkle, and I don't get how Iroas and Pharika didn't get there. Maybe there just wasn't enough left after Kruphix used it to support that ambiguous appetite. I'm not saying it isn't cool for Wizards to go against their own flavor. I think it would add more to this picture, rather than just having a faded centaur along the skyline.

This is by far the most aggressive of the Gods since Thassa, and it's going to show up in Standard. As such, I think it'll show up at Commander tables a little later, but Iroas is ready to go right now. Having both Pyreheart Wolf and Dolmen Gate is a huge bonus, and there's plenty of incentive to getting the 7/4 online and attacking.

Although I have been looking for a viable Red/White EDH deck, I'm a little off-put by this one. The obviously good card will always be obvious, and it just feels a little too easy to build. That doesn't mean I don't think it'll be good- I would have just preferred a little bit of a challenge.

Our last card is the only non-God Legend in the block, and the oddest.

Meet MTG's King Midas. Because everyone he touches turns to Gold tokens, which you can sacrifice to add one mana of any color to your mana pool.

Back at BotG spoilers, I thought we might get something like this based on Gild, the which does what this cursed King does when he's "Inspired." This block has been full of foreshadowing.

Whereas I find Iroas good, but easy to build, I find Macar bad, but challenging. That's intriguing to me. Combined with a great piece of art by Greg Staples and we've got ourselves a stew going. I really hope to see someone overcome the weirdness of his ability, and his lone Creature type. There's a deck here, for sure.

Well, that kicks off spoiler week. Be sure to check out GG's Review of the Set, splitting it into Threats/Answers/Mana as we've switch to full Journey into Nyx mode here on TGZ.

Pass Turn.
-UL

In General: Commander Fantasy League Part 2

Hey Zoners, Grandpa here. Today's post is a continuation from last week, where I talked about a variant for casual Commander play called Commander Fantasy League. Check out the post here to get up to date: Part 1. Today, I am going to be talking about some supplemental rules that can be used to add spice to any Commander League!

Prizes - The main draw of playing in a Commander League is the advanced level of competition and structure. As far as competition is concerned, things can always be taken to a new level when you have something to play for. Personally, I am always trying to win every game and striving to make the best possible play for a situation, but some people just aren't that motivated. To get them more involved you must use the carrot, since the stick isn't exactly available for casual use. But that is certainly no obstacle! There are plenty of great things to play for above and beyond bragging rights. Using entree fees to fund a prize pool is a great idea, as long as the entry fee can be kept low. Sixteen people putting up $5 each will leave you plenty of money to pay for expenses and flaunt a sweet card for achieving ultimate victory like a Liliana of the Veil. I would recommend these guidelines for the value of prizes. First place should receive AT LEAST 500% the cost of entry. If you are using the prize to try and attract additional players, the expected value of that prize must be significant. As a matter of practice, I also advise that second place receive something as well. A good rule of thumb would be 100-200% of the cost of entry.

Team Play - If you have a ton of interested players, but don't have the time or space to hold dozens of individual matches each week for months on end, then team play is a great alternative to shrink the schedule. Depending on how many participants you have, Two-Headed Giant, or 3v3 Emperor could both be viable team structures. I am not going to lay out the specifics of how to play these game types within this article. The available resources on the subject are adequate for you to "get where I am going with this" and make the logistical decisions for yourself. This will work out better if you are able to assemble the teams from among friends or players of similar skill, but there must also be a mechanism for matching up loners to round out a team. This should go without saying, but I can't endorse any Free-for-all style league matches, any game format that allows for odd numbers of players in a game, or uneven teams.

"Keeper" Draft - Something fun that you can do in a league where you have very few new entrants and a large contingent of returning members.  You can select a small number of cards, I'd recommend three or fewer, that you get to keep after a season. These cards will stay on your team for next season. They can't be drafted by anyone else and you still end up with the same number of cards for your 'team'. If you choose to keep a card then you simply forfeit draft picks beginning in round one. If you choose to utilize all three of your keeps, it is just like you are picking those three cards in the first three rounds of the draft, except no one else is allowed a crack at them. In general, I think keeper leagues should hold to these two rules: First, no keeping your general. It is less fun if one guy is always hogging the commander that you want to play with. Secondly, set some arbitrary limit on how many seasons you can keep a card. This should definitely scale to the number of players in you league (larger leagues should allow fewer keeps), but for simplicity's sake I think the line can be drawn at one. So you draft a card, keep it for next season, then you have to release it back into the pool for next season. That doesn't stop you from drafting it, but it does give other people a chance to play with it if they are willing to pick it highly, which you obviously would have been , given that you were willing to burn a first round pick to keep it.

"Bye Weeks" - When I say bye weeks, I mean for the cards on your fantasy team, not the players in your league. This is a wonky optional rule so stay with me. Each week, cards of a particular converted mana cost are banned! They cannot be played in any deck. It doesn't matter if you drafted the card to your team or if it was a 'free agent', if one drops are on a bye this week, you can't play your Thoughtseize. There are two ways you can assign what is number is on bye each week. Either just use the number of the week, i.e. no 1 drops during week one - no two drops in week two - etc. Alternatively, use a random number (probably restricted from 1-8 or 1-10 since only a certain range of converted mana costs are relevant in Magic) to choose what is on bye. Either way, you need to assign these byes before the draft and make sure they are noted on the schedule. Participants need to be aware that they must update their decks and they should be given this information in advance so that they have time to prepare. Publishing this information before the draft lets them strategize at a deeper level and draft a deck that can change easily.

Well, that was a fun little detour. If this short series inspires you to start a Commander League in your playgroup, make sure you send us some feedback on your experience. I am sure you will have some excellent stories to tell. Coming next week we will have full coverage of Journey into Nyx! Following that, we will be back to our regular posting schedule.

The Stack #53- Let's Split Up, Gang

Happy Saturday Zoners!

We're off rippin' and flippin' early here at TGZ, semi-well-rested from a short little R'n'R and ready to bring the goodz.

And by flipping, I mean your favorite weird mechanic from your favorite Asian-Inspired Magic block: Flip Cards.

So let's turn this upside down.

THIS IS THE STACK!

GRANDPA GROWTH'S PICK

Grandpa Growth- THUMBS DOWN
I have only ever maindecked two of the Kamigawa block flip cards in Commander; this one and Kuon Ogre Ascendant. Gardener is a cool card, if slightly underpowered. It lets you play extra lands early on in the game, which I am a big fan of. Once flipped it is probably going to die immediately, but that is okay. The real point was to ramp you up to big mana so you could deliver the finishing blow.

I have a soft spot for the 'dolphin'/'flipper' cards. They are an elegant visual design and feature some of the most inspired pieces of art in all of Magic. It is unfortunate that the mechanics have to be constrained to short, simple abilities in order to fit in the reduced text boxes, but that didn't seem to be much of a problem. These cards had a wide variety of functions, spanned multiple card types, and didn't require altering the cards backs. The latter causing somewhat of a ruckus when it was done in Innistrad. This is a design space that is worth taking a second look at in my opinion.

Venser's Journalist- THUMBS UP
This is very much a big nasty green machine card, and the incentive to have more lands only makes this card's flavor more stereo-typically green. I think the amount of mana it takes to activate the Weaver of Life's ability is a bit steep, but the bang you get for your buck should be tremendous.

I think what I like most about the Kamigawa split cards versus the Innistrad flip cards is the fact that there really isn't a way that I can perceive for you to flip the card back once the flip conditions are met (besides bouncing the card). This definitely puts more control into the player's hands rather than relying on the way your opponents play.

Uncle Landdrops- THUMBS UP
The problem with the Innistrad flip cards were that 1) They were mostly a mindless tribe and 2) In most cases they weren't worth the effort to flip, and your opponent had control over flipping them back. It's evident, based on the big flippers in Standard, Delver of Secrets, and Huntmaster, that the key to these design was incentive to flip, and the value done through these actions. If they were to revisit Kamigawa (Which I've heard they never will), or just re-visit this mechanic, I'd love to see a nice blend of the two. That way we can get the art and the value. I'm beginning to make the effort to incorporate some of these into my decks, simply because they're unique to Magic.

VENSER'S JOURNALIST'S PICK

Venser's Journalist- THUMBS UP
I'll be honest: I don't have much experience with split cards, mainly because Kamigawa was not my favorite block (it's good, yes, but their Spirits are kind of bad). So, hypothetically, I'd like to experiment with this fun moonfolk. Perhaps I'm a bit predictable, but counter magic is a huge deal to me, and I could see this being very productive in a "Talrand says 'NO'" deck.

Of course we could never use Erayo as a commander, but the Enchantment is worth having if you want to synergize with counterspells (perhaps you'd like some more merfolk tokens, Lullmage Mentor). Though, the countering one spell a turn is still the highest thing on my list of reasons why I'd like to experiment with this card. Making an opponent waste a spell, even if he/she chooses what spell to waste, is still an advantage in my book.

Grandpa Growth- THUMBS UP
This card is dramatically underplayed in Commander. Most people, myself included, tend to shy away from it because it is banned for use as a Commander by the EDHRC, but it is still legal for main deck play. People seem to agree that this doesn't conform to the 'spirit of the format'. I tend to think that the 'spirit of the format' is nonsense. I am of the opinion that this is a preeminent strategy in Commander. That being said I have something of a gentleman's agreement with myself to not play it, instead searching for worthwhile alternatives, but the card demands respect, that is beyond contest.

Uncle Landdrops-  THUMBS DOWN
I actually play against this monster semi-regularly. One of the decks in my group is a Damia "You Make The Combo" deck in which the player pieces together several synergies which allow him to take over the game and lock everyone out of cards and have Forbid backup so that he can win with Laboratory Maniac.

Whereas most Erayo locks are real and abusive, this is much more of a time-based lock at a point in the game, used to get tempo, so I don't particularly hate Erayo in this instance. However, I still fail to understand why anyone would want to play somethingthat invites a lot of unnecessary hate and creates board states that I find tired and boring in the EDH landscape. Underplayed, and for a pretty good reason.

UNCLE LANDDROPS' PICK 

Uncle Landdrops-  THUMBS UP
One of the more interesting mono-Red decks I've played a lot of games against is Homura. The guy who plays this in my group started it as a Dollar General deck with a bunch of nonsense creatures from the bowels of Magic's History (Soldier of Fortune always seems to find his way into play) and an Umezawa's Jitte, which was and still is one of the most ballsy choices of anyone in my playgroup (including myself) to date. Commitment to the Jitte was strong with this one. I don't think I could ever do something like this, let alone make it even kind of work. So kudos, I guess.

These days, the deck has become refined and unrestrained by budget, so it's got a lot more heat. Still, Homey decks everywhere are going into hiding because they're on the endangered species list while Gods are present, so now we're all playing Green and White for Deglamer/Return to Dust, and hoping someone doesn't bring one to play to our table as a Commander.

Grandpa Growth- THUMBS DOWN
I agree with UL. It is a very bad time to be a Kamigawa 'dolphin' card. The expanding influence of Theros God cards has led to increased resistance for strategies that rely on Enchantments, and more generally multiple permanents in play. Homura was already on the fringes of playability in Commander and now has basically no place. Not even for the fact that it is probably just worse than Purphoros. There was definitely a moment in history where you could make a mono Red list like this work. Homura into Jokulhaups + Goblin Assault and you run away with the game. You could leverage Scrying Sheets, Extraplanar Lens, Goblin Charbelcher, Caged Sun, Gauntlets of both Might and Power. There is a real deck in here somewhere, unfortunately it has been supplanted by bigger and better things.

Venser's Journalist- THUMBS UP
I personally like the theme that Homura brings to the table. Mono Red dragons may not be the most effective deck design ever, but Homura's Essence does pretty cool stuff! Yes, I want all my Creatures to have Flying and +2/+2. Call me out of touch, but I really can't speak too much on the Theros block since I've been trying to go back in MTG history to find some quality cards.

-UL/VJ/GG

TGZ News 4/25/14: Journey into Nyx and Announcing...

TGIF Zoners! Grandpa Growth here with a couple quick announcements!

First, this weekend is the Prerelease tournament for Journey into Nyx. This is your first opportunity to play with the new cards and get your hands on some sealed product. Make sure you reserve a spot at your local store for the event and have some good old fashioned fun playing with the new set!

Secondly, coming up next week we will have coverage of the new set here on the blog all week long with our set review. Uncle Landdrops and I will be breaking down all the cards and giving you our take on how JiN stacks up in the land of Commander. Make sure to check every day next week for the new content as it goes live!

Finally, we have a very special announcement. We are all very excited to reveal that we have a new contributor joining the team here at The General Zone. A long time friend and associate is ready to make the jump from consumer to creator and will be taking over the Thursday spot on TGZ. He has chosen the Zachroling as his pen name, spoiler: his name is Zach and he likes Saprolings. I won't give away too much more now, but look for his articles coming soon on Thursdays and he will be sharing his thoughts with us every Saturday in The Stack! Give him a warm welcome as he settles in here on the blog.

This has been a public service announcement. Thank you for listening. That is all.

-GG

Downtime

Hey all.

We know school's winding down, etc., and we've seen the correlation. So I'm taking some time to planeswalk in the real world this week and do other site maintenance things to get ahead.

We have some exciting changes coming this week on the blog, but I won't spoil it for you. Expect things to progress as normal from here with a surprise on Thursday, The Stack on Saturday, and In General on Sunday.

Pass.
-UL

In General: Commander Fantasy League Part 1

Hello and welcome back to In General. On Sundays, your old Grandpa Growth, discuss broader topics. Developing your skills, strategy, psychology, skill development, etc. Usually not specific cards or decks. Today I am going to be discussing a twist on Commander that can be used to add some spice to an established local metagame.

I like football. Not too unusual, although there are certainly some Magic players who couldn't possibly care any less about it. I also like fantasy football. It is a sad time of the year for me right now. Football season is still months away. So how do I cope with the boring days between sports seasons? By making a Commander Fantasy League, obviously! Some well established Commander playgroups will become large enough that it is helpful or necessary to create an extra set of rules to help regulate gameplay. One such idea is that of a Commander League. In a Commander League each Commander can only be used by one individual player. Players compete against each other 1-on-1 or in teams. Results are tracked and at the end of the league 'season' someone is declared a winner. Pretty basic. Here is the twist that I am offering:

Instead of just the Commander being unique to a deck, players will draft an entire 'team' of 10-15 cards (depending on the number of players in the league) and only they can use the cards that they drafted for their team. Only one person has Sol Ring. Only one person has Command Tower. Cards that don't get drafted may be used by any player (and any number of players) in the league. Let's break down some of the basic rules that make my idea tick:

Basic Rules:

The League - You will almost certainly want to have an even number of people in your league, as that will keep the scheduling process simple. Also, the more people you can pack in the better. Some good numbers are powers of two. I recommend 16 or 32 if you can assemble it. This will simplify the scheduling process which we will discuss in a moment. You will also need to mandate what the game and match structure will be, as well as deciding how many league games will be played each week. This determines how large the time commitment will be each week and will substantially effect participation levels. Hint: lower time commitment will increase involvement and reduce burnout. The length of the season matters as well, but it is easier to have a single pair of players play a make-up match next week than it is to have 32 competitors stay for another hour or more to play a third match in a given week. Finally, consider how someone will 'win' the season. Are there playoffs? Seeding? Here is my suggestion for a structure:

• One league match per week. Best 2 out of 3. No time limit. 
• Try to have them at a specified place and time so the league members can view and monitor other league matches. I recommend having at least one league player available to spectate each match and confirm the results.This let's you interact and build relationships within the playgroup as well.
• Competitive level rules enforcement. Have a judge handy for dispute resolution (as most shops will anyway). 
• Record the results of each match on a weekly report and the weekly progress in a accessible location like a spreadsheet, poster in the store, or a Google doc. 
• If you have 8 or fewer players: Use a 'Round Robin' style schedule where each participant plays one match against each other participant in the league. If you have more than 8 players, restrict the schedule to an 8 week season at most. This keeps things tight and fresh and will allow new players who are interested to join quickly while also drawing the season to a length where the drama can reach a fever pitch!
• If a player has to be absent, they should play a make up match following the same rules, keep in mind that there should still be at least one other member of league there to observe. Or just play the missing match at the next league meeting for simplicity. 
• Have an informational meeting before the league draft so that members can make any necessary decisions ahead of time such as: what the exact schedule and format will be. Creating a calendar to mark holidays potential bye weeks as well as get information about participants schedules in advance to avoid no shows and missed matches. What cards are banned, what is legal, etc. This will help orient new players and give a strong signal of what to expect.
• Once that meeting is completed and all the players are acquainted with the system, you will need to have a second meeting to determine a draft order. The schedule should be set at this point and should be available for viewing by the players. It is important to know who you are playing when before you draft so that you can really dig into your strategy. 
• Have the 'teams' of cards chosen by a draft. This ensure that the power is properly spread out among the players and that no one deck becomes too over-powered. There is an issue about card availability: Can I draft a card I don't own? How do you overcome the disparity in the size of two players' collections? These issues are tough, but I have a simple answer. Allow proxies in league games. This gives everyone an equal footing and lowers barriers to entry. I will discuss an alternative rule in next week's article that alleviates the need to rely on proxies. 
• Make the goal for winning the league clear. Two examples are most wins in the regular season or having a post season playoff tournament. Prizes optional, although I don't recommend straight up gambling. 
• Decide on a system for tie-breakers even if it seems unnecessary. This could also be used for playoff seeding or next season's draft order. I suggest the following hierarchy, to be applied in order: 

1. # of match wins
2. Head to head match result (if a match was played between the two tied players, the winner of that match wins the tie-breaker. If not, then continue.)
3. # of game losses (The player with fewer game losses, not to be confused with match losses, wins the tie-breaker. This means that winning a match 2-0 is much better than winning 2-1.)
4. Inverse draft order (Finally, if none of the above can break the tie, the player who chose later in the draft selection order simply wins the tie-breaker.)

• Have at least one, preferably more, person to serve as a league administrator. They will insure results are recorded and reported accurately. They will print up the schedule, draft, calendar, and team rosters. They will serve as the first point of contact for new members or problems within the league. This can be a lot of work, so I suggest sharing this responsibility or rotating it to a different participant each season. 
• This whole idea requires a lot of time and effort to organize. It is not unreasonable to think that some money will be necessary as well for shared supplies, space, and compensation for the administrators' time. Instituting a participation fee is reasonable as long as it is as low as possible. Keep in mind that money can be a significant barrier to entry for many people, especially younger players. 
• Speaking of fostering the young, this is about community. This whole idea of a league is about building that community. Creating friendships, educating and exposing players to new things, comparing strategies, and creating camaraderie. Don't let the institution overtake the fun. This should be helping, not hurting your community at all times. Never lose sight of this. 

The Schedule - Part of the reason to play in a dedicated league instead of just playing some random games against the other people in your local shop every weekend is to have a more rigid schedule. You'll want to set up a fixed schedule ahead of time; i.e. after the draft, but before any league games are played. This adds a new dimension to the competition because you will know exactly WHO you are playing against every week and WHAT they are playing. This allows you to metagame special tech for certain matchups. Or not! Keys to a good schedule are:

• Give time between league matches for players to update their decks. One match per week is sufficient to keep interest and build drama while still giving players time to think on strategy and source cards for next week's match.
• Two players shouldn't meet more than once during the 'regular season'. If you are having a 'post season' make it single elimination. 
• Make sure the complete schedule is available at all times AND before the draft, if possible. 
• Just like in Organized Play events, winners are responsible for reporting results, which should be kept public and current.
• Don't change the schedule once it is set. I don't recommend having a 'floating' schedule where the winners play last weeks winners or anything like that, except in a single elimination playoff scenario.

The Draft - This is the important part.

• Assign a draft order ahead of time using a random lottery. I don't recommend using reversed rankings (last place finisher picks first, winner picks last) to assign draft order because it can't account for participants joining or leaving the league.
• The draft should take place in the open and all league participants will need to be in attendence. Everyone gets to see what players are picking what in real time so that they can make informed strategy decisions. Using some kind of board to write things down will insure accuracy and help prevent two players from accidentally picking the same card multiple times.
• I recommend using a round-reverse order for picks. I.e. the pick order inverts every round as such: 1234 -> 4321 -> 1234. This is also known as a 'snake draft'.
• In the first round YOU MUST PICK YOUR commander. This is why I  recommend round-reverse over the standard round order. The person who has the last pick of commander will get the first crack at picking for his main deck and vice-versa for the player with the first pick.
• You CANNOT pick a basic land for your team, but any other card is fair game unless it has been banned or previously picked by a player. 

Construction - Basically what you would expect. Because of the 'team', and given that each player will need between 30-50% land in their deck, you should always know about at least half of what your opponent is playing, but that other half will be a constantly changing mystery!

• You must play all 15 of the cards on your team in your deck every week, period. You cannot change your Commander ever. The other 85 cards are up to you and can be any eligible card not on another player's team or banned. You can change these cards as many or as few times as you want, although not during a match. This will encourage two things, you should try and scout your opponent to get an idea of what he is playing so that you can tune your deck to beat them. Secondly, you should change your own deck often so that your opponents cannot easily metagame against you.
• Other than that, Standard Commander rules apply: only one copy of each card, no sideboards, exactly 99 card library, only one commander, your deck can only include cards that are within your commander's color identity and lands that produce those colors. 
• Before a league match is played you will want to check each participants decklist to make sure it is following these deck construction rules. This is something the judge and administrators can take care of. Just like in tournament play, if you suspect a participant's deck does not match his decklist or he is playing with a card that is on someone else's 'team' you can call for a deck check to be performed by the judge. That being said, come one guys. This is a casual commander league. Stop cheating at casual formats.

Thanks for reading guys! I hope this inspires you and gives you the tools to try out Commander Fantasy Draft in your own play groups. Next week I will follow up with some ideas on strategy and some optional rules to spice up any version of Commander League. If you have any experience or ideas pertaining to casual league play, feel free to leave a comment! Until next week, Zoners.
-GG

The Stack #52- We're After Your Lucky Charms

After several weeks of the UL and GG show, The Stack welcomes VJ back from his mini-hiatus so that we can discuss our favorite charms.

So let's cut to the chase with our favorite Marshmallow Shapes.

Hearts? Stars? Horseshoes? Nope.

THIS IS THE STACK!

GRANDPA GROWTH'S PICK

Grandpa Growth- THUMBS UP
I think the sweetest charm is probably Esper Charm, but I never play it. This is by far the charm that I play the most. In Commander I like to get it on Isochron Scepter. In Pauper, it fogs a Creature for one turn or temporarily removes a blocker, jumps your Creature, or Cycles at the very least. It isn't huge value, but the key to the power of any charm is its versatility. I love these cycles whenever they get printed and I am always excited to see more. I look forward to sets with dedicated groups or color alliances specifically because it means there is a chance for a new charm cycle.

Venser's Journalist- THUMBS UP
Never have I seen this card in play, but good golly do I want to. There has to be some kind of advantage to drawing a card on the next upkeep, but the only thing I can think of is to prevent a possible discard. Phasing is also unusual, and something that I've often fancied; but alas, I'm perhaps "too young" to fully understand Phasing. If anything, this card is purely intriguing to me, not to mention the kick-ass artwork.

Uncle Landdrops- THUMBS UP
Just beyond surprised at how under-represented this is in the Commander lists I've seen. I'm guessing it's because players don't want to have to learn phasing, which is a bummer. I won't say Phasing is a great mechanic, because it creates and fosters some serious inefficiency. Still, this is the kind of stuff that's really found a nice home in the format and wants to be played in Commander. Not only is it flexible, but can give your opponent the equivalent of a "curve ball" if they aren't on the up-and-up with the old school tech.

VENSER'S JOURNALIST'S PICK

Venser's Journalist- THUMBS UP
I've already mentioned my love of this card in the past. Though the efficacy of the card was more aligned towards Standard or Modern game types, it is still relevant in the world of Commander. I feel that with the right deck, this could be game changing.

The Lifelink until end of turn is really what wins me over in terms of this card's use in Commander. Very few people I play with have life-gain focused decks, but the ones who do (and they are usually Bant colored) have a copy of this in their decks for this first ability.

The last two abilities are admittedly much better in 60-card decks, but are still valid moves in EDH. Being able to stick someone's commander on top of their deck, then finding a way to shuffle him in is always fun. Though this is by no means efficient compared to other "draw card" cards, trading out one card for another is never really awful.

Uncle Landdrops-  THUMBS UP
The thumbs I put up are often just because I'm willing to play the card, or have actually played it. This encompasses a lot of cards, naturally.

This was in my Daxos deck, where I feel like its abilities were relevant. The card draw was a need, the life gain was part of the strategy, and the Time Ebb/Griptide put a creature in the way of Daxos' trigger.

Even through all that, I wasn't that impressed with it. My go-to's of Memory Lapse/Lapse of Certainty and Unexpectedly Absent were enough, and signifcantly more tempo.

I'm not unwilling to try it again, I'm just kinda turned off by it. I thought it would be a flexible version of something I was already trying to do in the deck, and it really wasn't. I like it, but I'm not beyond replacing it. Really wants to be part of an Isochron package.

Grandpa Growth- THUMBS DOWN
This card is among the best of the RTR charm cycle, though that isn't saying much for its power level. When the best use for a card is to just change it into another random card, for an additional cost of two colored mana mind you, then the card isn't very good. There isn't really much reason to play a Time Ebb effect since there is already so much high quality removal available in the format. If anything Submerge is probably the best in this category and sees little-to-no play. More generally, I don't even like where this color combination is in the format. Bant and Esper, despite adding an extra color's worth of depth, pale in comparison to the power of U/R or U/G decks. Without a good reason to play this, or a good deck to play it in, this is definitely not on my list.

UNCLE LANDDROPS' PICK 

Uncle Landdrops-  THUMBS UP
This is a card I've been playing in various decks for years now, and I think I'm going to be very alone when it comes to even wanting to play Evolution Charm, because I know it's really not that good.

Still, I can't deny how functional it's been in tight spots- Specifically in mono-Green. It gets me land early on. It gets me another threat later on, or a pre-existing threat evasion for a nice surprise "combat trick."

At common, and as an Instant, this is as good as Green is going to get to Sapphire Charm, and I'm okay with that.

Grandpa Growth- THUMBS UP
I have put some limited mileage on my single copy of this card. Even if the third mode was blank (which it often is), the first two abilities have surprising synergy; one being good early and one being good late. It is usual for charms to feel under-powered when you just read the abilities; the power of flexibility is hard to gauge. Unfortunately, this doesn't require much thought. It will be obvious what mode you are going to choose the moment you draw this card, but in more casual lists this can be a solid roll player.

Venser's Journalist- THUMBS UP
I don't know If I necessarily agree with UL's saying that this card is "not really that good." For him, it may have been good in tight spots; but for me, I see much potential in this card. The second ability is really what does it for me. I enjoy the fact that green is also associated with reviving creatures from the grave, so that I have insurance in my Rafiq of the Many deck or in my Kamahl, Fist of Krosa deck.

-GG/VJ/UL

Deck Files: The Adventures of Dromar #2

Happy Late Post Tuesday, Zoners!

I don't have a whole lot of new, complete thoughts or decks to share with you, especially with our Journey into Nyx on its way, so we've returned to Deck Files with a quick, succinct update of Dromar and a summary of the change log.

I've been smashing Dromar and his old-bordered cronies against of variety of competition. From experience, I've found it best to bash the deck with no real intentions when a design seems to lack rules text themes.

Unfortunately, Dromar hasn't had a chance to really find out what he's made of in the Invasion Dragon Battle metagame, but bashing against a bunch of different kinds of decks has allowed me the chance to make some modifications. So let's look at the change log.

LANDS

Subtractions:

-Forbidding Watchtower, Faerie Conclave, Spawning Pool, Salt Marsh, Coastal Tower

Additions: 

+ Plains, Island, Swamp, Strip Mine, Dust Bowl 

Notes:

The Cycle Lands proved to be much better than the Man-Land cycle, and having both was too much land coming into play tapped. The deck really wants to play spells quicker, so I've gone back to doing what I do best- playing Basics. Strip Mine and Dust Bowl were added more for the purposes of hating on decks outside of our Dragon Battle, but can still be used for tempo. 

SPELLS

Subtractions: 

-Liberate, Forced March, Planar Overlay, Catastrophe, Wing Shards, Blatant Thievery, Dream Cache, Dust to Dust, Cabal Conditioning

Additions:
+Oblation, Plague Wind, Akroma's Vengeance, Swords to Plowshares, Frantic Search, Desertion, Spite // Malice, Reviving Vapors, Snap, Skeletal Scrying, Bribery

Notes:
There are a lot more subtractions than additions here. I found I wanted to have better quality than quantity for removal, so that's what happened. Forced march was better for tokens, but why bother when I can just Plague Wind. Akroma's Vengeance is also a good cycle spell, and potentially an avenue for theme here. I'm currently fiddling around with an Aurelia deck trying to use Cycling as a theme, but it might go better in a triple colored deck with better cycle spells. That, plus Desertion and Bribery were much better suited to the mana base. And now I feel like GG.

NONCREATURE, NONLAND PERMANENTS

Subtractions: 

-Treachery

Additions:
+Helm of Possession

Notes:
This might be short-lived, but I made this swap less to accommodate Dromar and more for another deck which really wanted Treachery. 

CREATURES

Subtractions:
-Preacher, Cloud of Faeries, Cavern Harpy, Alabaster Dragon, Great Whale, Faceless Butcher, Hunting Drake

Additions:

+Willbender, Silent Specter, Ebon Dragon, Merieke Ri Berit, Quicksilver Dragon, Mischievous Quanar, Chromeshell Crab

Notes:
The creature base is what is going to need the most work, as playing old bordered cards almost ensures that they will be underpowered. Still, it doesn't hurt to have a little disruption. Merieke was just a complete improvement from Preacher, and let to a pretty nice victory over Karametra by taking a Panglacial Wurm. My morph package hasn't done a lot of work yet, but I'm thinking it's going to be pretty okay. Dromar sees a lot of hate when he hits the table, so if I can play crappy mystery creatures with half-decent abilities to distract my opponents, I'm just going to do it. Of these, I love Mischievous Quanar. 

Well, that's all I have for today. Be sure to keep up with the spoilers for our new set, as we'll be talking about them at length in the next couple of weeks or so.

Also, be sure to check out another deck straight out of my local playgroup that was featured on CMDR Decks- Tyler's Niv-Mizzet the Firemind.

Link is here.  Tyler's Niv-Mizzet the Firemind.

If you guys have decks you want to talk about and share with the Internet, CMDR Decks is the place to do it, so email Uriah at cmdrdecks@gmail.com for all the details on that. This is something I'm going to be doing on the regular, so be sure to subscribe to the channel if you want to see what me and some of the other TGZ staff members are brewing up.

Last bit of news- We have a new challenger approaching us, so stay tuned for his first article which will hopefully be coming to you soon.

Passsssss....

-UL

In General: Five Edges From Commander

Welcome to In General. On Sundays I, Grandpa Growth, write about more general topics. Not so much cards or decks, but formats, strategy, skill development, and psychology. Today we will be discussing five minor skill edges that are unique to, and can be developed by playing Commander.

I have written in the past about other formats and the virtues of playing multiple formats. There is much that you can learn by expanding your horizons and each format helps develop different skills that are useful in Magic at large. As always, I recommend learning as much as you can in order to grow as a player and person. Note, this will not be a full-scale examination of the Commander format as I have done in previous articles like this one on Booster Draft: Draft Punk. I will save that idea for a future rainy day, but instead I am focusing in on just a few important points that I haven't seen get any attention elsewhere.

1. Vintage-Size Card Pool
Commander has the largest card pool of any constructed Magic. Period. Depending on the community you are playing in, it will likely have the smallest banned list of any constructed format except Standard (which isn't much of a comparison). Fact is, if you want to quickly expand your knowledge of older sets and cards, there is no better format to play. You can literally see just about anything in Commander. From Alpha to Zendikar and everywhere in between. Being good in Commander requires a strong knowledge base which includes a working knowledge of the massive card pool. You certainly can't learn this invaluable skill from playing Core Set limited, that is for sure.

So what does this really get you? The element of surprise...or at the very least your opponents will not have it. You know the cards. You know the tricks. You won't be caught of guard by an obscure offering from an earlier time in Magic's history. How often do you have to stop and read your opponent's cards? If you didn't know it existed, then you didn't know what it did. If you didn't know what it did, how could you have been effectively playing around it?

2. The 'Gifts' Effect
On a somewhat related note, this point is also about knowing a larger percentage of Magic's total card history. Because Commander is a 'highlander' format, you can only play one copy of any card other than basic lands. That means we will have to include different cards that fill the same roles. We will build consistency through redundancy. Diversification instead of duplication. This is the Gifts Effect. Named after the card Gifts Ungiven, which ironically is 'banned' in Commander, by the EDHRC. Gift Ungiven forced players to build their decks with this principle in mind. In order to leverage the power of Gifts as a tutoring effect you needed to include several copies of cards that did similar things, but had different names. This strategy for deck building is crucial to Commander. You MUST use it in every deck.

What we learn from this is to create small mental libraries of common replacements for certain common cards. What are the best two-man removal spells? What are the best five mana Creatures? Knowing this information will not only help you build better decks in every format, but also help you play around a wider variety of cards. Instead of thinking, what if my opponent has removal? You can be much more specific. What if my opponent has Condemn instead of Path to Exile? Go for the Throat instead of Doomblade? The intricacies of these cards don't necessarily matter in every game, but represent significant drawbacks when they CAN'T do what they were supposed to.

3. Free Mulligan Decision
The Mulligan. Appoximately 50% of the time this will be your first decision of the game. The first moment where you have agency as a player. It can often be the most important decision you will make all game long. A bad mulligan decision can often be your last decision of the game as well, leading to an underwhelming performance and no-contest concession. Commander is already an incredibly skill testing format, but it has another unique feature that forces us to be better players: the free mulligan.

Some people have wrongly surmised that the free mulligan actually makes people WORSE at mulligan decisions. This is just silly. Simply incorrect. The more times you experience a given decision, the better you will become at making that choice in the future. That is the way humans learn. I have never, read that again, NEVER played against someone who was able to build a deck specifically to abuse the 'advantage' of a free mulligan. Commander trains players to think about mulligans the proper way: Is the average six card hand better than this seven card hand? The twist you learn from Commander is: is this seven card hand better or worse than the average seven card hand?

4. Building in Answers
For the most part, Commander is a wide open format. Most people aren't worried about building a hyper-competitive list to crush the tables. That leaves plenty of room for innovation and that means you will see some off-the-wall strategies and cards. For one, this means that we can let out our inner brewers. You could build a crazy deck, but you could really do that in any format. What is different about Commander is that there is no pressure stopping EVERYONE from doing it. If there are prizes on the line, most people will play whatever deck they think gives them the best shot at winning. This makes it much easier to guess what people are playing in Standard, for example. Making that same determination in Commander is slightly more complex.

Two decks, even if they are the same colors, even if they have the same commander, could be WILDLY different. You have to be prepared for anything. Commander is like the wild west. There is no one to protect you except yourself. You have to build your decks with this in mind. You need to include answers to everything. Every kind of card, every kind of strategy. Hate cards for every zone: removal for Creatures, Artifacts, Enchantments, Planeswalkers, AND Lands. Discard. Counterspells. Ways to disrupt graveyard interactions. Ways to disrupt tutors. Ways to overcome card advantage. Sometimes even color-specific hate cards. This may seem like a lot to think about, but if you want to be successful in Commander, you need to be prepared to combat your opponent on any field of their choosing.

5. Variance
Magic is a card game. Card games inherently have variance. The luck of the draw is a grim reality for Magic grinders. Never is this more true than in Commander. You could have a Standard deck, that plays four Counterspell. It would not be ideal for you to draw ALL of your countermagic in a single hand. You will likely need a better mix of spells in order to win. In Commander, you only have one of each card, but you sometimes have DOZENS of roughly equivalent cards. There is a real possibility of the top 30 cards of your deck all being Creatures. How do you deal with that?

Commander has taught me that the best way to overcome variance is to get your deck as consistent as possible. I have a rigid formula for my decks. They all begin with the same skeleton. Specific numbers of lands, removal, disruption, and threats that I have found gives me a very 'average' deck. With this default starting position I can tune my lists to what suits them best. I have also learned that you want to keep your deck as freshly shuffled as possible. It can be annoying to mix up a hundred card library every two minutes, but you can't break up that big pocket of lands unless you shuffle consistently and often. I trust my deckbuilding skills to give me a deck that can win with an average draw. Part of that strategy is making sure that I shuffle enough for my draws to stay close to that average power level. This is just one example, but the main takeaway here is that Commander forces you to play through high levels of variance, which can be strong mental edge that carries over to other formats.

That's all for this week Zoners. I will be keeping my eyes glued to the visual spoiler every day as new cards from Journey into Nyx are previewed. If you like the article, share your thoughts in the comments. What do you think is the biggest psychological/skill edge offered by Commander? Thanks for reading and I will see you guys next week.

TGZ NEWS 4/11/14: Duel Decks, Duels 2015, and Spoilers

After a short lull following the release of Born of the Gods, TGZ News is back with some exciting new developments in the world of Magic: the Gathering! New duel decks, Duels of the Planeswalkers 2015, and Journey into Nyx spoiler season is upon us! Let's take a look.

Duel Decks: Speed vs. Cunning
Announced earlier this week on Daily MtG, this Summer's Duel Deck release will be called Speed vs. Cunning. Not much information was given in the initial announcement, but we can safely assume that it will follow the same formula as previous Duel Decks offerings: a few cards will feature new arts, there will be a couple of cards that haven't been printed in the new card frame, and there will be one or two money cards to try and hook us into buying an otherwise extremely boring product. Unlike other limited print Magic products like From the Vault or retro booster boxes, you can expect this to hold MSRP for a while...mostly because there won't be anything of value inside. Link to the announcement below:
http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/arcana/1463

Duels of the Planeswalkers
This year we will get yet another iteration of Duels of the Planeswalkers, the annual release video game that ties into the annual release of the Core Set. This year's offering has some interesting twists! It will include the ability to fully customize decks from a larger pool of cards and to build your own decks. Whereas previous games have forced you to use under-powered pre-constructed decks and substitute only a certain amount of cards, Duels 2015 will push the game closer to the full customization potential of the Magic Online platform. Speaking of platforms, Duels 2015 will be available on Steam, Android, Xbox Live, and Xbox One. The expanded story mode will focus on escaping Garruk, who has been cursed by the Chain Veil. This essentially confirms that the Garruk featured in Magic 2015 will, in fact, be Garruk the Veil Cursed. This points towards Transform being the featured mechanic in this year's Core Set, although that has not been confirmed. Link to the announcement below:
http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/arcana/1470

Journey Into Nyx Spoilers:
In an exciting change of procedure, Wizards has begun running previews a week earlier than usual. We will get to enjoy a full three weeks of spoilers leading up to the release of JiN. Stay tuned to Dailymtg.com for the latest spoilers as they are previewed and make sure to read our ongoing coverage of all the spoilers right here on The General Zone.

Till next time Zoners, this is Grandpa Growth signing off.
-GG

Five Questions For Building Better Mana Bases

Part of the reason I've self-appointed the nickname Uncle Landdrops is because it's a silly sound-alike from the a snow monkey spacefighter pilot named Andrew Oikonny, whose uncle happens to be Andross- but it's also because the mana base is the most underutilized, and my favorite part of the deck.

So today I'm going to take you through a Self-Assessment I've turned into a kind of FAQ that I use every time I go to construct a mana base.

1. What Are You Trying To Accomplish?
The term "good mana base" is subjective, and even if it's not, the common, surly answer is that you want your deck to win. It's a common sense to ensure you can cast whatever spell you have at any given time. Still, some decks may have the need for more advanced utility/game plan tactics, and depend on serious color intensity from Turn 1 to the end of a game.

This first question serves to establish a dichotomy between two different kinds of mana bases- my non-elegant nicknames for them are "distracting" and "focused." Distracting isn't a bad term, per se. It's just meant to describe a very non-basic heavy mana base which employs many lands that tap for multiple colors, storage lands, bounce lands, man lands, disruptive lands like Strip Mine and Maze of Ith- basically anything that takes a thought about when to play it or activate an ability that isn't a mana ability.

Unlike "Distracting" mana bases, Focused mana bases are going to be literally all basics, next to zero lands that come into play tapped, and are honed so that you can play a 7-cost spell on turn seven, regardless of the required colored symbols. Focused mana bases will employ non-basics, but they will probably be leaning on Terramorphic Expanse and other fetchlands to ensure that spells will be cast.

While I lean more towards focused mana, playing 25+ basics and Terramorphic/Evolving Wilds in 90+ percent of my decks, mastering a blend of both will most often be the optimal mana base for a deck.

Even if you're not into labels, it's just good business to have a good vision with clear goals for your mana base. Most people find it's best to build from the ground up. This is just the opportunity to do it literally.

2. What Is The Optimum Number Of Lands To Play In A Deck?

I used to say, "Play 40. It's the magic number. It's the only number." While forty is a great benchmark for most decks, and I think it's the best place to work from if you build your mana base first, it's not always the right number for every deck. With 40, it's pretty much going ensure land plays until at least turn 6 or 7- which will hopefully allow you to see your deck in action during the Solitaire, sample draw stage of testing.

Here now, I think the better advice is to, "Count down from 40." There are several factors you can consider, and hopefully, they are all questions you can answer because you're amending your mana base after you've put your spells together. These are the factors I examine when determining land quantity:

-Draw Power/Library Manipulation.
-Average Converted Mana Cost of the Deck.
-Converted Mana Cost of the Highest Spell you can actually play (If you have an X spell, what's a satisfactory number you can put in there?)
-Converted Mana Cost of the Best Spells in your deck.
-Mana Rocks/Sources.
-Can You Get Infinite Mana? Is that the aim of the deck?
-You- Shuffle Mechanics, Luck Ratio, Personal playstyle.

Generally, I find that the optimum number is the first one that pops into my head when I ask myself this question. These days, the numbers I generate run from 36-42, with the former being a non-Azusa green deck with ramp spells galore, and fortified with all the card draw I can find, and the latter being a slower Wrexial UB deck fortified with control spells, and wants to be able to cast him at turn 10. I don't recommend trying this at home though, unless you've built a lot of decks and you've got a pretty good understanding of the last factor I listed above.

3. How Many Of Each?
This answer is pretty easy. Plug it into a Deckbuilder site, then sample draw. If you are a fellow Zoner, you may have noticed I like TappedOut.net a little too much. Having used a couple of other places, like TCG Player and Essential Magic, I'd be a fool if I told you the competition was superior. For other format variants, these alternatives are fine. For Commander, TappedOut really allows you to "build" the deck, using it as a tool throughout versus putting the deck together and posting it at the end.

For mana purposes, it is the best. There's a nice little circle graph in a circle graph once you put your deck in that demonstrates the ratio of mana symbols in your deck to the colors of mana you can tap for. It's a surefire, simple way to make sure you get it perfect.

Because science isn't always itself, be sure to give the deck a good shuffle and test (which you should be doing anyway) after you've got the numbers right. Sometimes you need more mana to cast a certain off-color spell in the deck, which is against the grains of efficiency, but necessary to strategy. So just be looking for little things like that so you can get it right. The more testing you do here, the more exact you can be.

4. What About Nonbasics?
Other than Terramorphic/Evolving Wilds, an m10/Innistrad dual, a Shock land, and possibly a Lorwyn land, there aren't many lands I'm going to immediately sleeve up outside of basics. I've found that if you make your manabase this way, then put together your spells, then tweak the land as necessary, you're able to see what's going on, and adjust accordingly.

I really only have a few non-basic specific guidelines.

-Keep lands that enter the battlefield tapped to under four, no more than 7.
-Painlands are good, but they're better when you have ways to gain life. So if you use them, make sure you have ways to do that.
-Utility lands that only tap for colorless are easy to hide in mono-colored decks and artifact decks, but the only ones worth playing otherwise are the LD Squad- Tectonic Edge, Wasteland, and the Strip Mine. Of course there is a Mikokoro Exclusion Rule here too, but it's at your own risk. If you've got that much color intensity, chances are one of the colors you're playing has some draw power anyway. Again, I'd try to play as few lands that tap for colorless as possible.

5. Did You Accomplish Your Goal(s)?
This is a question to ask yourself after you've played 1-4 games with a deck, and you've got it either fresh in your mind, or you took some quality notes about the deck.

Naturally, the deck should win. Still, there's a lot to be said about having to do "too much" piloting with your mana base that you forget triggers on more important cards, or even vice versa. You're not trying to lose out on value, so don't.

A while back I had a conversation with my playgroup about cards that "make you look stupid" because they require more work for little-to-no value. Taurean Mauler is my best example. I was playing it in Animar last year, and ended up cutting it after realizing that I just didn't care enough about my opponent's spells to remember its trigger, so I cut it for Instigator Gang.

The same can be done with lands. Don't be afraid to get back to basics. If you're playing a storage land, either use it or cut it. Other than making it more of a target, and forgetting several triggers, there's no incentive to play these outside of Proliferate decks and Vorel. So stop putting the extra responsibility on yourself, and keep the mana simple.

One of the biggest things I look for after a few play-throughs is the pace of the mana. "Smooth" and "Rocky" are the two ways I like to examine land plays- Smooth being consistent land plays and the ability to cast the cards in your hand in the turn that they become available, and Rocky being the latter, with a bunch of tap land that gives you the feel bads and makes your deck look slow.

While there is a strategy to looking open and pitiful in multiplayer, the Smooth mana base is almost always better. This isn't to say Smooth mana bases can't or won't play tap-land. Chances are a good mana base probably is. The player just has enough basics to support a tap land on a random turn.

Recently, I've started using cycle lands to test my mana. If you run into more situations where you have to play the cycle land than use it to draw a card, chances are it's just better as a basic. If it isn't, then the mana base is probably pretty smooth.

After a few games is most often when people revisit the deckbuilding process to tweak. So make sure that you're also getting in the habit of reassessing your mana base and playing with the numbers of basic lands, at the very least. That way you won't run into trouble moving forward.

Pass Turn.
-UL

Card Corner: Sapphire Charm

Today's Card Corner is somewhat inspired by one of the decks featured on CMDR decks this week.

Fellow Zoner and member of my playgroup Matt AKA "Matt" is showing off his Taniwha (pronounced Tah-Ni-Fah, apparently, because it's Maori, and some very angry people are upset that we were phonetic) EDH deck on the YouTube Channel CMDR Decks.

So here on TGZ, I thought we'd spend just a few minutes talking about one of my favorite little pieces of theme-y tech from Matt's Dollar General Taniwha Gyarados design- the Sapphire Charm.

This is truly Grandpa Growth tech, as he is the first person I ever saw play Sapphire Charm, and that might be surprising to some of you- Cause he doesn't normally like goofy things.

Still, he's pretty notorious for playing any card that says, "Draw a card," and that's probably why it found its way into random mono-blue decks he was playing a few years ago, and in an Isochron Scepter package for this insane Vorosh BUG Control Deck that proved tough to beat in 1v1.

What I like about SC is actually its second mode though. Tempo is the one-word answer I'd give if I was trying to describe my approach to the game, because it is the generation of momentum and general quickness that can get you out of almost every situation. Playing tempo-focused games, whether it's controlling it, or just finding the right window in which to generate it, is often the best way to win games.

Phasing is the theme of Matt's Taniwha deck, which is why this card is in there. For those who've never had to care about this bygone mechanic, Phasing is an ability that triggers simultaneously with the untap step, moving permanents back into the visible spectrum of the battlefield if they were not in before, and out if they were in play at the time of the untap step.

Essentially, this turns Sapphire Charm into a weird Fog on your opponent's biggest creature, which can be important when getting damage through. Again, tempo. Optimal timing and precision with this take skill, as does having the patience to wait until you really need the card draw.

Although these are the primary functions of SC as I've seen it, getting this card on an Isochron Scepter has allowed me to abuse all of its functions. Giving a creature flying might not be that great, but evasion is real, as is knowing the card's entire potential. I know I've had many moments with modal cards where I've forgotten all the things they do. However, if you can keep it all square in your head, or do a quick run-through when you draw the card without arousing too much suspicion, Sapphire Charm is a great little instant to throw into your deck.

For those interested in more Phasing, and seeing me and Matt share his Taniwha list, check out the video below.


Pass Turn.
-UL

In General: Out of Fashion

Hello, and welcome back to In General! On Sundays here at the General Zone I, Grandpa Growth, write about high-level, conceptual topics. Metagame strategy, player psychology, game theory, fundamental strategy, etc. Last month, I spent each Sunday discussing the metagame breakdown of Commander. I started with what a metagame composition is, how one gets created, what the driving force behind the Commander metagame is (it's Fashion in case you missed the series), and I spent the last two weeks discussing how to update your decks for the current trend in the format: Devotion. I received a lot of positive feedback on these articles and we saw a big rise in views here on the blog. However, I saw one question cropping up a lot and was even asked face-to-face in my personal life: If Commander is so heavily dominated by the decks that are 'in fashion', then what are we missing? What should we be playing instead?

This is an interesting question. Not often do I openly assume my analysis to be correct, but that is the default position I have to take in order to answer this query. If I am right and people are OVER-playing Devotion, what decks should they play instead to improve their percentages and playing ability? Well, not surprisingly, I have a couple of unsubstantiated ideas.

I am going to talk about the three Devotion decks that I have personally played against the most. I think personal experience is the best place for me to speak from when answering such a nebulous question. It would, of course, be preferable to fall back on the data proving which decks get played and what has the highest win percentage, but such documents simply don't exist. Instead we will have to settle for anecdotal evidence. Let's take a look.

Making Big Red sexy since 2013.

It is tough for me to think of Purphoros as over-played because I legitimately believe it to be the best Mono Red deck in the format AND the best choice for a Commander port of a pure 'Red Deck Wins' strategy. I like that it exists, I like that people play it. They are trying something old and new at the same time. Aggro needs to be good for Commander to be healthy. The ETB trigger on Purphoros just makes so many cards into must counter spells. Firecat Blitz. Goblin Offensive. Hostility + basically any burn spell. Purphoros has put Mono Red in the most competitive spot it has ever held in Commander, but this deck does have one glaring weakness that I can't stand. It lacks disruption. Zoners, you should know by now that Grandpa loves his disruption. So what do we do instead...?

Disclaimer: I am not responsible for your
friends hating you. 

I bet you weren't expecting that! "But Grandpa, you hate gimmick decks! You hate chaos decks! Why are you supporting the enemy?!" Simple. Norin is good. Much better than most players would give it credit for. The deck is just rock solid AND the internet community has pretty much nailed down an air-tight competitive version. This is a highly resilient, highly disruptive combo deck that attacks from a very unconventional angle. It has only gotten better since Theros block dropped. In fact, Nykthos and Purphoros are two of the best cards in Norin decks! Now, I am not ENCOURAGING you to play Norin, because that would mean a nonzero percentage of people would start doing it and then I might have to play against some of those people and that would lead to an immediate and measurable decline in my quality of life, BUT hell man...at least I am honest.

You wouldn't want to take him home to
Mom and Dad, but ladies love his whip.

Erebos is also very good, but unlike Mono Red, Mono Black has a wide variety of high quality generals to choose from. Mono Black also has a deep pool of cards that can act as Devotion enablers. Phyrexian Obliterator and Necropotence come to mind. There are plenty of other decks that can leverage the power of these cards, and Nykthos as well, while using a different captain for their ship. The generic strategy of getting ahead on cards and getting ahead on board works for Erebos, but in this case the simplicity makes it somewhat vulnerable. Sweepers and removal can represent a hurdle for decks trying to assemble a high Devotion count. That is the silver lining for people trying to stay off the Devotion band wagon.

Early in the game I'd rather have a Erebos,
but in the late stages I'd much rather have
an active Geth. 

Because people need to dedicate more slots in their decks for answering and managing the God cards, less space is available for niche hate cards and other semi-sideboard technology. In this case I am talking specifically about graveyard hate, but other examples can be shown. I recommend playing a graveyard-centric Black deck. Both strategies are powerful, both are vulnerable to specific hate cards, but I have learned an important lesson from playing competitive constructed events. The less popular combo decks are more successful. Take a look at Twin decks in Modern. The more popular the deck becomes, the worse it performs. As Twin's win percentage falls, people tend to become more concerned about beating Pod or Storm, which, in turn, leads to a rise in the success rate of Twin. The analogue for Commander is clear: both Black recursion and Black Devotion decks are powerful and popular, but the one you want to be playing at any given moment is the one that your opponent DOESN'T have the hate for.

Drawing 2-3 cards per turn is a great way
to overcome removal and take over the game.

Of all the Gods printed so far, Ephara's triggered ability is the most appealing to me. What can I say? I dig drawing extra cards. It is also easy to trigger. In fact, of all the replacements I am talking about today, this is the easiest to make. GoST and Ephara really want to be in the same deck, but the choice of which to play as a general is very dependent on the matchup. They are both resistant to certain kinds of removal, but not THE SAME kinds. They synergize incredibly well together. They both belong in a fast, disruptive, aggro-control brew. The kind of deck that I can really get behind.

This is turning into GG's list of the most
annoying cards to play against.

I feel a little dirty recommending that people play Geist. In fact, at the height of Hexproof's popularity in Standard, I was playing against more Geist decks than I could stand -  in every format. Geist is just good; not much else to say. A second alternative could be Bruna, Light of Alabaster, but I don't want to shamelessly recommend a deck that I, myself, play. That seems like a conflict of interest to me. That being said, if you want a more dedicated theme in your deck, or just don't want to play a lockout, Counterspell deck, then Bruna is a great place to start. It is strange to me though: for all the history and popularity Blue/White has in Magic, there are very few UW Legendary Creatures that are really playable in Commander. By contrast, Esper, which is historically a much less popular control deck, has many, many more appetizing Commander choices.

Thanks for reading guys! I promise: the five week rant about the Gods is finally over. Next week we will be back to more regular topics here on In General. As always, feel free to share your thoughts in the comments. What decks do you think are being underplayed because of new Theros block cards?
-GG

The Stack #51- Paired Technology

Grandpa and I are doubling up again on this week's Stack, as we return to some semblance of tech, be it moving over from Standard, year's of Standard's past, or stuff from the back of the R2-D2 bin at your Local Game Store.

At least, at my store, this is where all the misfit cards go. Hopefully you have something that's almost as cool.

I was told when I posted the topic that "tech" was "too broad" a topic, and I don't tend to disagree. Each person has their own idea of what tech could be in this instance.

Even in our staff, we disagree about this word. Grandpa Growth thinks it more along the line of "Staple," a good card that can get slotted into any deck.

I'm more inclined to believe there's a special quality to a tech card- something that gives an individual card an optimized role and additional power-up when placed into a certain list.

Anyway, enough chit chat. This is THE STACK!

UNCLE LANDDROPS' PICK 

Uncle Landdrops-  THUMBS UP
It's no doubt Animar makes every card better, but this card makes Animar absurd. Do you think you're going to chump block Animar? Do you think you're going to play creature tokens? That doesn't work either, and at such a low CMC, I can play him early, or play him as a next-to-last spell a la Boros Bushwhacker to create the element of surprise. Hashtag, The Right Way To Make Battalion Creatures And Flavor Work.

Grandpa Growth- THUMBS DOWN
Ehh, I am not all that impressed with this card. Even in an Animar deck I don't see the need. Animar is huge and can't be by 40% of Creatures anyway. Of the remainder...well Animar is enormous and usually brings friends. I am definitely on board with attacking past walls of tokens. Those little buggers really get annoying after a while.

GRANDPA GROWTH'S PICK

Grandpa Growth- THUMBS UP
I have been quoted as saying: "Don't play CounterTop. It's not good in Commander." I also have a lot of fun when I am just flat out wrong. Counterbalance has a place in Commander: Value Vig. Through a combination of Momir Vig triggers and Scroll Rack, a local player of mine showed me that you can really stump some player with basic Countertop combo. This pairs up well with other great cards that you just want in Momir Vig lists anyway. Wild Pair is great since you have already built your deck with the idea of specific casting costs in mind. Lurking Predators hits a high percentage of the time when you know in advance what your top card is (Hint: you put a Creature on top with Vig). Alchemist's Refuge lets you cast a Creature at instant-speed to trigger Vig and set up a Counterbalance trigger. Equilibrium and Cloudstone Curio let you put permanents back in your hand, which Scroll Rack can then transfer to your library for Counterbalance. Watching this whole system in action is a beautiful thing. It is easy to look-off because there are so many working parts, but you don't need the whole machine to make it work; they are all strong cards in their own right! You don't need to lock a player out of the game with Counterbalance, countering two things will probably be enough! Imagine: You play a threat, counter their threat, AND guarantee that you are drawing another threat next turn. That is a massive advantage in tempo and on board.

Uncle Landdrops- THUMBS UP
This is a card, it just sounds like Momir Vig's got a special direct route to Magical Christmas Land. I'm not sure how this survives in other decks, and if someone gets this off, everyone deserves to lose. That's basically the way I feel about it.

GRANDPA GROWTH'S PICK

Grandpa Growth - THUMBS UP
In my current playgroup, I have a person who is a very early adopter. He is constantly changing his decks to try out the newest things and play with the newest Commanders from any set. Needless to say he jump on the God cards immediately when they came out. In the last few months I have had ample opportunity to battle against his brews and have learned a few things about fighting the God cards. I put my thoughts to paper in the set review on how I thought you could beat the inevitable flood of Devotion decks, but it wasn't clear at that time what existing decks tier-2 decks would simply BE BETTER and not have to adjust as much.

So far against the gods, I have had the most success with my UW Bruna, Light of Alabaster deck. Because I only really ever want one Creature in play, I can afford to play a ton of sweepers which allow me to regularly turn off the Gods and reduce Nykthos to a reasonable Devotion count. I also have access to the old school lock of Isochron Scepter Silence, which can preempt the casting of a God. What I have been most impressed with though is Meddling Mage. With plenty of Auras to protect it, like Pentarch Ward or Protective Bubble, Meddling Mage can really put the God cards back in their place. I still don't think this card is worthy of widespread play in Commander, but certain decks that can keep it in play forever will benefit from the ability to "just say no".

Uncle Landdrops- THUMBS UP
I really dig this pick. I've played Nevermore for a while now in Lin Sivvi, and I think it's kinda funny GG would rather play this than something you don't have to dedicate more protective resources to (like Nevermore), but I get it. I too have a soft spot for MM. It was one of the first rares I pulled in a booster, the name of this card is just too fun and flavorful. I like Poe, but the subtle, unconscious supplanting of him into the gothic horror of Innistrad still feels cheap, even though Kevin Bacon's TV show, The Following seems to be winning the Cheesy Poe Rip-Off battle against Mist Raven, Nevermore, and Co.

UNCLE LANDDROPS' PICK 

Uncle Landdrops-  THUMBS UP
My tech is a little more Commander-special, not just for every deck. After letting this fall off my last several orders for no reason, I finally got a copy and put it into Glissa T's, and the answer is yes- This card is almost another copy of Executioner's Capsule. I say almost because it hits the things Capsule can't, while also being less compromising of a mana cost, but also may involve killing Glissa to get a big threat out of the way. I like to combine it with silly equipment like Accorder's Shield so that I can make things a little more one-sided, but the results have been nice, even without it. Since most of my creatures have Deathtouch, fighting is fun.

Grandpa Growth- THUMBS DOWN
This is definitely technology. It is buried so far underground it is hanging out with my dead grandma. I like the idea of combining Glissa the Traitor with anything though, so I will probably give this a shot. That is just one of my favorite decks to play because I like value engines so much. It is also pretty fair, except when you get to abuse the bricks off of recursion until the board looks more like a deck tech than an actual game. Get all the lands in play, twenty something cards in hand, every possible Artifact you can cram onto the table. Good times.

Pass.
-UL/GG

Glowing Ranks #2: Unconventional Wraths

G'day Zoners!

Today we're on tap with another quick Top 5 in my new segment, Glowing Ranks- the place where I get to randomly rank Magic Cards. Though GR's barely a week old, I thought it best to give you another quick dose before you forget what it tastes like. Last week, we talked about my favorite counterspells.

This week, it's boardsweeps. "Wrath" effects for short. Because not all of them are Wrath O' God, Jay O'Dudge (What I call Day of Judgment), or Damnation. Some of them hit other stuff in their destructive wake, and I won't shy away from them either. Here's how I'm going to define "Wrath" for my purposes here:

-must be a noncreature permanent or spell.
-must say "Destroy All", "Sacrifice All", or "RFG/Exile All." (Black Sun's and Mutilate aren't excluded either.)
-must NOT contain "Lands" or a basic land type (Land Destruction is a totally different thing)
-may NOT be solely about removing Creatures (I know, that's where "Wrath" comes from. Mincing words is what I do though.)

Unlike my homie Grandpa Growth, who'll commit to 8-10 Wrath effects without blinking, I'm a man who likes his to put you downhill with card advantage rather than reset to zero. Because destroying things without ways to leverage card advantage is silly. That's not to say he doesn't either- he just isn't as intrinsically attached to the things he plays, and I am.

Normally, that's why I tend to rock the spot removal in its place. Paths over Wraths, Return to Dust over Fracturing Gust- you don't need rhymes to get what I'm saying. Still, it can't be denied that getting big with a boardsweep is a necessary part of the game, and while it may be unrelated, we're going to get equally as big with our list today, doing 10 of my favorite instead of the normal 5. Some may be more recent, and therefore slightly more "popular," but it won't take away from the fact that 1) I like them and 2) I find them to be generally underplayed amongst my own group and absent in a lot of the lists I look at online (again, unlike Damnation/Jay/Wrath).

10. Tsabo's Decree

Well, we're starting off with the cheeky tech first this time.

Tsabo's Decree isn't a card I've played yet, but it's one I can't wait to cast. I keep a sort of Magic in-game bucket list of cards I want to cast for big money, and this is certainly one of them. Do you play against token decks? Tribal? Is it worth killing two Titans and getting free info? If the answer is yes, then your metagame needs this.

9. Merciless Eviction

Eviction is still a wall flower looking to get into the Commander dance, and I find that kind of sad. When it first came out, it instantly had my attention. Grandpa's mentioned many of times, including in the review of this card, just how difficult it is to get a BW Commander deck online and successful. Because without access to ramp and card advantage support, this color combination really suffers.

The main problem with Eviction is that exiling stuff is harsh in a set of colors that really want to play their graveyard. Karador plays creatures. Sharuum plays creatures. Even the main BW deck, Teysa 1.0, doesn't really want to play it because it hurts her own combo.

Still, I think there's plenty of room in the Esper Control, and in some Rock decks for Merciless. Modal cards are really nice because they provide the flexibility to avoid certain kinds of cards. In that way, I see building around Enchantments to use as a way to stop the Gods, which might possibly be Merciless Eviction's best quality.

8. Rout

I don't honestly get why I don't see this card as much as Day or Wrath. It's actually not much more expensive than Day, cheaper than Wrath, and though you're almost always going to pay 7 on an opponent's turn, there isn't a whole lot of difference between Turn 5 and Turn 4 when we're comparing what they are at sorcery-slow. Even if you're playing in 1v1 semi-competitive environments, this is a better Wrath than Jay Of Dudgment. Just saying.

7. Pure//Simple (Mostly Simple)

This is one of my more nonconventional picks. Not having a Naya or five color deck yet, this is a card that's sitting around in my binder waiting its turn.

Now, Pure is the first thing we see moving from left to right, but Simple is really what we need to examine first. This is something I think the alternative Naya decks really want to play. Marath and Uril obviously like their goodies, but Rith and Mayael really like to slam normal Enchantments like Doubling Season and go to work. Having another side of the card that hoses a multicolored Commander at worst is just a bonus.

Flavor points all around for a card with all the power, and all the flavor you could want.

6. Retribution of the Meek


This will be the third time now that I've mentioned Retribution of the Meek here, and though that might be a slightly overestimation of what I think about it, it's not by much.

RotM is now a card in my Lin Sivvi and Doran decks, two places where the creatures are usually going to be smaller than this, and are fairly expendable, so it's kind of unnecessary.

Still, it doesn't take a genius to imagine how much nonsense people want to cast with at least 6 power to get a sufficient clock. At Turn 9, we're talking about a cheap Wrath followed by your own threat, versus doing this on Turn 10. Couple that with the fact that this Wrath only costs one white, making it uber-splashable. Again, another Wrath that's cost equivalent with Jay of Dudge. Remind me why people play this instead? It got overprinted? Alright.

5. Plague Boiler

This is the worst artifact Wrath Glissa T's has in her arsenal, but it doesn't make it any less fun. I mean, just look at the artwork. There are people running in a semi-comical fashion from this core-like object that just might be a giant onion on a sacrificial altar. Now who wouldn't go for that?

Seriously though, this card is super sweet to play. Most times you are going to let it blow up in three turns or sooner. However, there have been moments where I've played it too early, or I've done it with the intention of tricking my opponents into holding up creatures and cards they wanted to stick on the battlefield.

The best part being that unlike P-Deedy (What I called Pernicious Deed on the two occurrences in which I've seen it in play), Plague Boiler is an artifact. So Glissa T's can play with it all day.

This is for sure a piece of niche tech for Glissa, but I could see it working in Damia Control, where they might have access to Academy Ruins in addition to a Glissa T's amongst the 99. Maybe even other GB decks want to play this, I don't know. It's a nice budget alternative to Disk and Stone.

4. Decree of Pain

So... I guess it's time we talked about a real Wrath effect?

Decree of Pain is a popular card for sure. Hence the reason it got new art and two reprints in the last year. Personally, I'm glad. This is a card that gets me out of my "I don't want to play cards that cost more than 6" shell and actually cast them without feeling like a chump.

On top of this, Decree of Pain is almost always going to be playable. If you're only gonna draw one card anyway, you can cycle it. If you're going to annihilate a huge board, you've got value. Any time you can kill four threats and draw four cards I think you've got a good card. Heck, I'd even settle for 3, depending on the situation.

It's a huge cost, but definitely worth it.

3. Martial Coup

For starters, this is a weird card in the way that it works. Unlike Kirtar's Wrath, or Phyrexian Rebirth, the creatures actually come into play first, THEN wreak havoc. Not something that people outside of rules aficionados might care about, because it Wraths and gets you ahead in creatures. Nevertheless, it's still weird to me.

"Never" is essentially the answer to how many times you'll cast this card for less than X=5, because this card has immense value, and it represents a decent amount of damage if you've been playing the card advantage game.

Again, this should be a popular wrath, but I just don't see it or hear people talking it up. That's why we're here. I'll let someone else take the lead on starting the Martial Coup Awareness Club. I just can't handle more responsibility than this blog.


2. Blasphemous Act

Unlike the rest of these cards, Blasphemous Act is severely overrepresented in my metagame. Nearly every person except me has played this card I feel, I keep cutting mine, and I have to admit I'm a little jealous of this predicament. Because I did get a foil copy of this off VJ some years back, and it'd be nice to see it in action.

In case you haven't played against it, BA is B.A. This is a card that will never cast for 9, and do more damage per creature than Pyroclasm. Short of the Indestructibles, this has been known to mostly do the trick for most creatures in most metagames.

1. Gaze of Granite

Here at the top, the value is immense. Gaze of Granite is sweet, and I play the crap out of it. With Pernicious Deed excluded from my formerly budget Glissa T's deck, both on price and card type (No enchantments in the deck), G of G found a quick permanent home amongst the non-artifact removal I like to play. Hitting Planeswalkers is one of the better qualities of this deck, which takes a while to get online.

Since most of the cards I tend to play are recurrable, and the mana base is able to generate consistent land drops and sometimes multiple ramp, I tend to have zero problems getting this to scale to whatever game I'm in.

Normally, a top card needs to have all of the aesthetic qualities too in order for it to be my favorite. This is a huge exception. I don't really care about flavor text, or the stale ambiguity that is the artwork- I just care about rules and CMC.

Be sure to share your favorite Wrath Effects, or criticize mine in the comments below. I'm sure I might've missed something, so if I did, do tell.

Pass.
-UL