The Stack #60- Last Year's Hits

Afternoon Zoners!

Usually the New Year brings us time to reflect on the good and bad of the past one. That's what we're all about today- celebrating the best of the last.

Tom, Gramps and I have selected our best picks from 2014. So let's get to it.

THIS IS THE STACK!

UNCLE LANDDROPS

Uncle Landdrops-  THUMBS UP
I loved the scry lands, not just Temple of Epiphany. The whole cycle rocked, and gave us some powerful additions to every mana base. This temple was picked because it's my favorite artwork of all of them. The color palette has tremendous contrast, making it incredibly appealing, but the best quality of it is that the electrical storm brewing allows the card to both fit the Ancient Greek-ness of the Theros set while also transcending its own plane. With the Izzet guild so identifiable, I really like the fact that this card and artwork seems to slip right into another Izzet deck without seeming awkward. GG and I both liked how Wizards did something similar in Innistrad with the printing of the enemy-colored m10 counterparts, and I think that's where this set succeeds too.

Grandpa Growth-  THUMBS UP
 Yea...these cards are pretty excellent. I have been playing New Benalia in my mono White decks for years. I always thought it was great. These cards are just ridiculously powerful. Lands have become the most important part of any deck and, in modern Magic sets, some of the most expensive. Taplands in general feel pretty bad to draw late in the game, but the Temple cycle is completely different. If you are going to draw a land, you are so much happier drawing this.

Tom - THUMBS UP
I don't have a lot to say about the Scry lands that hasn't already been said. They're awesome. Topdeck manipulation and colour fixing in the same land? Be still my beating heart.

GRANDPA GROWTH

Grandpa Growth- THUMBS UP
Having played with this a bit, I am well and truly convinced that it is overpowered. Clone effects are almost always cheaper than the thing that they are copying. This is a fair deal because you often have to wait for an opponent to play something appealing before you can unleash your Clone, mitigating any potential tempo gains that would accrue from a less mana-intensive play.

 D^2 completely breaks the mirror by granting Haste and Dethrone. Your version gets to attack immediately giving you a clear tempo advantage AND your copy is often larger than theirs because of a single +1/+1 counter you get when coming from behind. How is this fair at all?

Uncle Landdrops- THUMBS UP
I was so excited for this because of Animar, and it hasn't let me down.

The last awesome thing I did with it was copy my opponent's Ulasht, the Hate Seed. For those who don't know, giving Ulasht more ways to get bigger on the battlefield lends itself to some serious power. Because Animar is a combat-based deck, predicated on getting wide, I got to a point in the game where I just turned him into a bunch of Saprolings and added some additional Hellrider triggers so I could kill both my opponents at the table.

Tom- THUMBS UP
I haven't had a chance to play with it yet, but I love Clone and copy effects. If it weren't for that pesky little bit of Red in the mana cost this would go right into my Roon of the Hidden Realm copy/blink deck. What really sells this card is the Haste, allowing you to hold it until after someone else drops their Blightsteel or Eldrazi in order to copy a big bastard and launch it an opponent immediately.

UNCLE LANDDROPS

Uncle Landdrops-  THUMBS UP
One of the finest mass removal spells I've seen printed. In my opinion, this is right up there with Wrath and Damnation, except it creates an excellent way to get one-sided with some of the weenier White or White-Adjacent decks.

Grandpa Growth-THUMBS UP
This is the best five mana Wrath; in my opinion at least. To create an advantage with Wrath, you usually have to set something up or trade away life points. In the decks that play this, there really is no set up cost. You have cheap Creatures, with which you are beating down during the early game. Naturally, your opponent will have bigger late game plays that outclass your Creatures. However, when you play this, you are right back on the war path. Your opponent is left with a frumpy frown and a bad taste in their mouth.

Tom- THUMBS UP
The only thing better than a wipe is an asymmetrical wipe. It's what justifies the high cost of In Garruk's Wake, it's what makes Martial Coup a nightmare in a weenie token deck and it's what makes Necromantic Selection into a potentially game-ending play. I get something while you get nothing, and it's really hard to argue with that kind of advantage when it's applied to multiple opponents. Best of all it works in the many, many new Alesha brews we're seeing to leave her army of midgets in perfect position for an aggro rush.

TOM

Tom -THUMBS UP
The moment I saw this guy, I knew I was going to build around him. There are so many potent death trigger abilities that draw cards, gain/drain life, force opponents to sacrifice and just generally give everyone a tough time that a general who can not only force sacrafice of creatures but get mightier from each death creates a constantly self-reinforcing deck in which every action benefits in some form or another.

So what makes the card so good? Well, the first and most obvious factor is the harsh punishment handed down on any opponent who tutors, ramps or cracks a fetchland. It's EDH, we know how prevalent this kind of thing is, and being able to shut it down is a slice of fried gold. Not to mention that Ob's ability gives poor old Maralen of the Mornsong a reason to keep getting up in the morning. However, useful as that is (and it really is - you wouldn't believe how often opponents will end up ramping/fetching lands with Ob on board just because they need the mana so badly), it's not what really puts Ob at the top of my list.

No, what drives my demonic pal into the top tier is his combination of two forms of evasion coupled with his ability to get bigger and bigger whenever another creature kicks the bucket. I've noticed that opponents will usually ignore this and focus on his anti-searching tech, but it's actually the latter ability that kills them in what is basically deathtriggers.dec. Be it through my own shenanigans with Skullclamp, Attrition, Ghoulcaller Gisa or Soldevi Adnate, potent symmetrical effects like Butcher of Malakir and Grave Pact, or simply targeted or mass destruction from the likes of Malicious Affliction and Plague Wind, Ob Nixilis accrues +1/+1 counters fast, and his flying/trample let him swing in for huge amounts of Commander Damage.

Grandpa Growth- THUMBS DOWN

I find it interesting that the reactions to this card have varied so widely. When my threats don't do something to immediately impact the board, I take issue - ESPECIALLY with expensive cards. This does grow quickly, so the fact that it is undersized for its costs doesn't particularly bother me. People use to play Scavenger Drake in this format, and at one time, that was acceptable.

The truth is that nowadays, there is no good reason to be playing a threat that matches up poorly against removal. There are enough good options in every color that you just don't have to make that sacrifice.

Uncle Landdrops- THUMBS UP
On an individual card basis, I do side with Gramps. Still, we all know O.B. Nix isn't exactly in colors that play fair when it comes to paying for spells, and this is something Mono-Black likes to build around. Premier Reanimation, Boots, and/or Greaves do well to fix the problems here.

GRANDPA GROWTH

Grandpa Growth- THUMBS UP
You've already heard a hundred people talk about how great this reprint is. You are about to hear a couple more people do the same. I am going to do something different.

I don't really 'get' the flavor behind the Dragon bones and the fetchlands. Take delta here for an example: the card seems to imply that the bones are doing the polluting or ARE THE POLLUTION. This is incongruent when you look Wooded Foothills or Windswept Heath, both of which have very 'pretty', nature-centric arts. On those cards it's implied that the skeletons are somehow empowering the growth of plants. Seems weird. Am I alone here?

Tom - THUMBS UP
As a relatively recent convert to the game of Magic, original fetches were way outside of my reach. These reprints have made them much more available, and as someone who loves an efficient mana base I'm overjoyed. The sheer potency of lands that search out the colour you need without an ETB tapped clause is high indeed.

Of course, my excitement has absolutely nothing to do with that foil Windswept Heath I pulled from one of my very first KTK boosters. At all. Ahem.

Uncle Landdrops- THUMBS UP
This was something I'd found to be an inevitable reprint, and I couldn't think of a better place and a better way to do it.

On top of being economically sensitive to players who held the $35+ original printings from Onslaught (This is because of the block-structure change), I think Wizards did a really nice thing within the confines of their story arc by using the reprint to connect the story of Ugin and his homeland to Zendikar, the last time we saw fetches in Standard. Additionally, it gives us a way to weave and re-weave characters to which we are already familiar with, which is a really smart thing to do in just about every way imaginable.

Well, that's how we stacked it up. We don't have much for news, but it is spoiler season! You can find our latest info and thoughts soon, but if you can't wait that long, follow me on Twitter @unclelanddrops, where I'm sure to be making snarky remarks, re-posting images from PAXEAST yesterday, or answering any questions you have in the future in 140 characters or less.

Until then, make good choices.

Pass.

-The TGZ Staff

Reviewing 2014: Hits

Welcome to The General Zone's annual review of ITSELF! At the end of the year we should always take a moment to look back and reflect on what we have accomplished this year. Here on the general zone we have had an interesting journey in 2014. Plenty of twists, turns, and surprises. In today's article I will be examining my own performance in the set review articles...starting with my successful predictions. If you were hoping to hear about my most dramatic slip-ups and omissions, stay tuned to the blog because next week's In General will be fully dedicated to my biggest misses.

So just to be clear, if you see a card on this list it means that my pre-release predictions about the card came true. Either I said it was bad and it was, or I said it was great and it is.

This card drew a lot of attention when it was initially previewed. There were many opinions about its playability on both sides of the coin. I however, would like to take full credit here for correctly determining that it was, in fact, not good.

The real killer here seems to be that there is really no easy way to repeat this effect. Worst Fears can give you a big advantage, but the up front cost is high. Additionally, being a Sorcery means that you don't have much control over when you pull the trigger on this, which is unfortunate.



I feel bad about this one, but when you're right: you are right. I think that everyone, from the design team, to the community, to the players, wanted Godsend to be good. It is just a really cool idea, but the execution falls short.

Personally, this doesn't discourage me, and I hope that it doesn't discourage R&D either. I want to see more Legendary planeswalker equipment in the future. I would love to find out what Sorin's sword could do or what Ajani's busted shovel-axe is supposed to be called.

It is pretty unfortunate that this is two colors, but that could also be a good thing. If this were just one color it would really be tearing up the league. Listen guys, I am going to break it down here for you real simple like: Haste is good. I know this might not be much of a revelation, but I have to take victories where I can get them.

This has been a banner year for Clone effects. We have seen some great updates that have brought this effect back to the forefront of the Commander game. After a change to the rules for how Commander treats cards like this one just a year ago, things were looking grim for the future playability of our shapeshifting friends. I for one am glad to see that they are still around and kicking, maybe as good as ever.

The Rabblemaster! Sir Rabblerino has had a great end to the year. A breakout performance in Standard has brought Gobbos back in to the spotlight in a big way. I am usually not down with the G-men, but I have been excited to watch the coverage of high-level tournaments this season because of how cool this Jeskai has turned out to be in Standard. It has been cool to see how the archetype has developed from the release of Khans, to the Pro Tour, to the Grand Prix scene. I am finally excited about pro-level Magic again.





Here we have another M15 card that is Standard legal, but this one hasn't yet been given its chance to shine...in Standard. To my people who keep an impressive library size, we have been loving the new Nissa. Apparently she is still on Zendikar and still busting stuff up.

Bring it in close here guys, because I have something important to tell you: Four lands...is a lot of lands. As Creatures and spells get cheaper and more efficient, four land might mean more than they ever have in the past.

This gal just makes so much mana, how could she not be good? Well, if you still haven't gotten on the bandwagon, we have plenty of room! Come and see why the grass is greener on the Green side of the fence.

Say no to the Rhino! Hushwing has seen action in Standard, Modern, and some limited Commander play. I have switched away from playing Aven Mindcensor and instead I am now packing Hushwing Gryff whenever I can.

I think that it is pretty funny that the place you most want to play this is in Modern Pod decks, but there are so few Pod decks left in the format that you don't have to worry about the mirror match very much.

You know I had to talk about this at some point. My exact words were something like, this is the closest thing to Ancestral Recall that we are going to get. AND BOY IS IT CLOSE! There isn't much left to be said about Treasure Cruise that hasn't already been said so I will just leave it here.

Alright, it's time to return to my college football extravaganza! I will be back next Sunday where we will turn the tables and take a look at my biggest whiffs; the worst predictions that I made in 2014.

-GG

In General: Conspiracy - Withholding the Beef

Welcome to a special edition of In General where we will be discussing the new casual product: Conspiracy. The set is somewhat small already, and contains only a handful of new cards. The set is also designed exclusively to be drafted, meaning that stereotypically under-powered Commons and Uncommons are littered throughout the set. For these reasons I will not be doing a full review of the set. Rather I will talk about a few key cards that I believe are playable in Commander. Next week I will discuss a few logistics issues that arose with the design and release of the set and give you my impressions of the mechanics. But first, a question:

New Cards

Starting at the top, we have a whole string of cards with the new mechanic - Will of the Wisp Council. Naturally, it is almost exclusively for use in multiplayer. However, based on the way some of these cards are worded, the possibility of a tie in the voting makes for interesting results in two-player games. Take this card for example. The result with always be that you choose a card....and you just get that card, regardless of what your opponent wants. That just to happens to make this one of the most efficient and versatile recursion effects available at common. And it is attached to a 3/3 Flier? Deal.


So I can't imagine anyone who is going to give you an extra turn for four mana. In a multiplayer game, if your board is empty as well as your hand you just aren't winning that game and no amount of pleas made to your opponents are going to help. You are almost certainly going to get the cards, but that is cool. It is a more splashable Concentrate. I can work with that.



Same story again here. You can almost always expect a single opponent to pick what is worse for you, but in a multiplayer game the same is going to be true in a different way. If your opponent casts a spell and then you Split Decision it, the other players are incentivized to just vote denial. Then you and the controller of the original spell are down a card, but no one else is. In effect, they profit from you trying to get cheaky. Either way, it is an easier to cast Counterspell OR Twincast. Same deal.

What is going on in this art though? It this guy going to get his hands chopped off? Sometimes creative gets a little carried away




This Demon token is going to be enormous. I am predicting that this will wipe away a few Creatures and then you get a 5/5 or bigger. The piece that this is missing is the word Instant somewhere in the middle of the card. Sorceries are so bad in Commander. They really have to be doing something incredible in order to be worth while.





Legacy playability will definitely help this card. Four point burn spells are pretty much always playable. Fetching Badlands instead of basic Mountains isn't free, figuratively speaking, but it will give access to a whole 'nother set of Flame Rifts. The deck isn't great, but this certainly isn't making it any worse.




The planeswalker, one of the few chase cards in the set at all, is a hit for fans of the lore. For constructed however, it isn't likely to make much of an impact. I can't think of any Commander deck I own that would want this. Perhaps Niv-Mizzet combo? It is cool to see Dack get his own card, but this is a little bit of a dud for me. The abilities just aren't relevant enough to the typical game. Stealing a Sol Ring could be a big game, but if they have had a Sol Ring for three turns and haven't done anything broken with it, they should have mulliganed.


Dack may be a lame card, but members of his posse have definitely got the juice. A Clone that gives Haste? This is something I have been waiting on for a long time and it is going to be crazy. This is the first and only card with Dethrone that I am going to be discussing. The ability is just very simple, very bland, and not powerful enough to change the landscape of a game. The possibility of cloning a Titan, Primordial, or Chancellor will have to be enough for now.



Drawing an extra card every turn is sweet. Getting to draw one on your opponent's turn is an excellent bonus to boot. Triggering Morbid is very easy, as we saw in Innistrad block limited. Commander is just absolutely FULL of removal and stuff to point it at, and Black/Green is the perfect color combination to get the maximum value out of this enchantment. Solid card, if a bit unexciting. Definitely worth slamming into decks like Savra or Glissa.



A Reanimate effect that doesn't restrict the targeting to your graveyard is awesome. A Reanimate effect that doesn't target at all is a card in very good company. This has none of the symmetry problems that plague things like Exhume, and you get the immediate bonus of being able to mill extra cards from both player's libraries before you decide what to return. Insane. Groundbreaking may seem like a strong word to use, but this truly is. Expect to see this card. It will come to define the standard for U/B reanimation effects.



The final new card I will be discussing is, in my opinion, the LEAST interesting of all the Will of the Council cards. I can say with certainty: I AM NEVER voting to return all the nonsense in my opponents' graveyards to the battlefield. No matter what the perceived benefit is, or the expected value, or how quickly you think you can win, I wouldn't do it. I won't even be playing this card. It is straight up worse than Immortal Servitude and Sunblast Angel. I don't even think any deck has room for another copy of either of those cards, particularly when this substitution has such high variance attached. Silly hats? No thank you.

I'll leave you now with a word about the reprints and my final thoughts on the set. There are a number of high profile reprints included in this set. Cards like Mirari's Wake and Pernicious Deed are highly sought after by the Commander community and making reprints of them available is a welcome gesture. However, the majority of these important reprints are at the Uncommon rarity or lower and don't command a particularly high price. Mortify is awesome and oft-played, but it wasn't pricing anyone out of Commander. At the same time Misdirection will drive up the price of Conspiracy packs as players clamor to open Legacy playables.

The decision not to release this product online makes sense. Programming the new multiplayer draft format into Modo would be a logistical challenge, but this product doesn't look like it is going to have enough appeal to the average player to actually make people want to play it on a consistent basis. The gimmicky draft-altering cards are not going to be making widespread appearance in Cubes, and with good reason. They are largely absurd, and as I will discuss next week, if you wanted this kind of thing you already had access to it: in your imagination.

I was disappointed by the Conspiracy product. There was a distinct lack of powerful new cards. The mechanics didn't to anything to stretch the bounds of design space or give me anything that I wanted more of. These, combined with the under-promotion of the product, has left me with a bad taste.

That is all for this week, Zoners. Until next time.

-GG