Magic Wankery (Was: A Big Thanks)

[Popcornguy13]

Thank you Flowerchild! For making such an awesome mod for the community to enjoy(hate, love, envy, whatever you want them to feel...).

[BinoAl]

I approve of your avatar :)

[Popcornguy13]

If you know what it's from, I'll approve of you.

[BinoAl]

If you know what it's from, I'll approve of you.

Heh, as far as I can tell, I'm one of the biggest MtG geeks on the forum :)

[Gilberreke]

Heh, as far as I can tell, I'm one of the biggest MtG geeks on the forum :)

I used to be one, ages ago. I stopped playing around Torment I think. Started playing when 4th came out.

I still remember the dread of Lotus coming out and having a weenie deck versus a deck that has one Balance somewhere :)

[Popcornguy13]

So, what do you guys think about the Core set 2014?

[Gilberreke]

So, what do you guys think about the Core set 2014?

I've stopped reading about new sets a long time ago. I kept up with it for a while (up till Kamigawa?), but now I don't bother anymore.

[BinoAl]

So, what do you guys think about the Core set 2014?

I'm excited for Slivers; They're easily my favorite race :)

[Gilberreke]

I'm excited for Slivers; They're easily my favorite race :)

Oddly enough, I've got a thing for birds. Commander Eesha and Thieving Magpie are probably my favorites.

[BinoAl]

I'm excited for Slivers; They're easily my favorite race :)

Oddly enough, I've got a thing for birds. Commander Eesha and Thieving Magpie are probably my favorites.

Weird; There's not much tribal support for them. I mean, with cards like Adaptive Automation, Brass Herald, etc, I guess it could be done. Hell, I made an infinite combo based thrull tribal deck once, I guess anything is possible ;p

[Gilberreke]

Weird; There's not much tribal support for them. I mean, with cards like Adaptive Automation, Brass Herald, etc, I guess it could be done. Hell, I made an infinite combo based thrull tribal deck once, I guess anything is possible ;p

Soulcatchers' Aerie offers tons of tribal fun :)
Soulcatcher may be even more versatile, being a creature.

I wonder if I could come up with a cool fun Vintage tribal deck revolving around birds. It wouldn't win against anything serious of course, but still.

[BinoAl]

Soulcatchers' Aerie offers tons of tribal fun :)
Soulcatcher may be even more versatile, being a creature.

I wonder if I could come up with a cool fun Vintage tribal deck revolving around birds. It wouldn't win against anything serious of course, but still.

Oho, nice :)
That could be badass as a sort of weenie deck with repeatable graveyard recursion.
Gravitational Shift could work well, if you went UW. UW has a ton of flying support in general

[Azdoine]

How do any of you keep a handle on all of these cards? I could never remember the names of all the cards in my collection, only barely in my main deck.

[johnt]

I dunno, there was a time in the late 90s where I had pretty much every card released from beta up through the Masquerade cycle memorized, including rarity and approximate dollar value. The obsessiveness that goes along with being a teenage boy, I guess.

[Gilberreke]

Oho, nice :)
That could be badass as a sort of weenie deck with repeatable graveyard recursion.
Gravitational Shift could work well, if you went UW. UW has a ton of flying support in general

Yeah, and there's tons of those kinda cards hanging around. I should download magic workstation and work out a deck.

Keeper of the Nine Gales
Stormscape Familiar
Welkin Hawk
Squadron Hawk
Celestial Gatekeeper

[BinoAl]

How do any of you keep a handle on all of these cards? I could never remember the names of all the cards in my collection, only barely in my main deck.

Heh, I guess it's sorta like how most of use remember every block in minecraft, crafting recipes, etc. If you spend enough time on something, you generally remember most things about it. Plus, Gatherer is a big help.

Oho, nice :)
That could be badass as a sort of weenie deck with repeatable graveyard recursion.
Gravitational Shift could work well, if you went UW. UW has a ton of flying support in general

Yeah, and there's tons of those kinda cards hanging around. I should download magic workstation and work out a deck.

Keeper of the Nine Gales
Stormscape Familiar
Welkin Hawk
Squadron Hawk
Celestial Gatekeeper

Ooh nice, I'm surprised how well this could work. I've made flying-focused decks before, obviously, but a bird tribal deck could be pretty badass :)
Also, I personally recommend Forge (Totally unrelated to Minecraft Forge, obviously). It's got rules support, and generally keeps up very well with new sets

[Gilberreke]

Okay, here's my first try at a tribal bird deck:

Land:
6x Plains
4x Island
4x Seaside Haven
4x Nimbus Maze
4x Glacial Fortress

Creatures:
4x Warden of Evos
4x Soulcatcher
4x Squadron Hawk
4x Stormscape Familiar
4x Suntail Hawk
4x Judge's Familiar

Other:
2x Cloud Key
4x Soulcatchers' Aerie
4x Battle Screech
4x Supreme Verdict

Works pretty simple. Soulcatcher's Aerie is essential to get your birds bigger. Suntail Hawk and Judge's Familiar are the cheap birds at 1 mana. Then there's Squadron Hawk, Stormscape Familiar and Soulcatcher at 2 mana. Aside from that, Cloud Key, Warden of Evos and Stormscape Familiar reduce cost to cast by 1, so you'll almost always be buying all birds at 1 mana.

Seaside Haven lets you sacrifice birds to draw cards, powering up the Soulcatchers. Supreme Verdict blows up all the creatures in game, for super powering the Soulcatchers. Battle Screech lets you make more birds.

Pretty simple, but effective.

[Fret]

When I just started playing magic, I played against roughly that deck I think. A guy from my fencing lessons played a bird tribal deck that was way better than my starter kamikawa spirit deck, but he was terrible so I won most of the time :D

[BinoAl]

-birdysnip-

Looks good overall, but I'd personally lose the Supreme Verdict for a sacrifice outlet like Martyr's Cause, or even Altar of Bone, if you splashed green. Supreme Verdict is an awesome card in general, but generally, it's not a good idea to use board sweepers in such a quick playing, creature centric deck. The focus on death triggers lets you recover more easily than most from board sweepers, but it still shouldn't be a goal

[Gilberreke]

Looks good overall, but I'd personally lose the Supreme Verdict for a sacrifice outlet like Martyr's Cause, or even Altar of Bone, if you splashed green. Supreme Verdict is an awesome card in general, but generally, it's not a good idea to use board sweepers in such a quick playing, creature centric deck. The focus on death triggers lets you recover more easily than most from board sweepers, but it still shouldn't be a goal

I used to run a deck similar to this with wrath of god. It's always been a staple of Soulcatcher decks. From my tests against other decks, every time I draw Supreme Verdict, it's game over for the other guy. Especially if you do the Cloud Key + Supreme Verdict + Squadron Hawk combo.

First you bring out Cloud Key, pick creatures, then you drop Supreme Verdict, giving all birds that come into play afterwards +X/+X (about +4/+4 on average against other quick decks it seems). Lastly, play Squadron Hawk for 1 mana, find three others, drop them too for another 1 mana each.

Takes about two turns to set up, nets you four 5/5 flyers. If you have Seaside Haven in play, sack one of them to get three 6/6 flyers and you get get to draw a card for two mana.

Lastly, the Supreme Verdict is there as defense against green bloom decks and possibly black weenie decks. Might even be fair against blue since it can't be countered. Green bloom decks can be fairly faster and out-creature you. Supreme Verdict fixes that fast.

You are not wrong, however. The deck needs tweaking against certain meta games. But since I have no reference, I can't fix it. The deck has no way to get rid of artifacts for example, so an equipment deck could wreck havoc against it. If I were to make more decks, I could balance them against each other I guess.

[BinoAl]

I used to run a deck similar to this with wrath of god. It's always been a staple of Soulcatcher decks. From my tests against other decks, every time I draw Supreme Verdict, it's game over for the other guy. Especially if you do the Cloud Key + Supreme Verdict + Squadron Hawk combo.

First you bring out Cloud Key, pick creatures, then you drop Supreme Verdict, giving all birds that come into play afterwards +X/+X (about +4/+4 on average against other quick decks it seems). Lastly, play Squadron Hawk for 1 mana, find three others, drop them too for another 1 mana each.

Takes about two turns to set up, nets you four 5/5 flyers. If you have Seaside Haven in play, sack one of them to get three 6/6 flyers and you get get to draw a card for two mana.

Lastly, the Supreme Verdict is there as defense against green bloom decks and possibly black weenie decks. Might even be fair against blue since it can't be countered. Green bloom decks can be fairly faster and out-creature you. Supreme Verdict fixes that fast.

You are not wrong, however. The deck needs tweaking against certain meta games. But since I have no reference, I can't fix it. The deck has no way to get rid of artifacts for example, so an equipment deck could wreck havoc against it. If I were to make more decks, I could balance them against each other I guess.

Yeah, I suppose it depends entirely on the meta. I've personally just not seen decks using sweepers for death triggers too often before; The ones I see are generally based on some sort of sac outlet, so you can have more fine control. I do tend to completely ignore whatever the opponent is doing to set up my side, though, so I'm far from the best source on these things, lol

[Gears]

This may be one of the best thread hijacks ever.

On topic, though, I haven't played much of MtG in years. I've got a good twenty decks in a box somewhere that my dad originally set up in the mid 90's that he gave to me, but that box is buried somewhere in my office.

I'm sure it'll turn up soon, but when it does I'm definitely gonna have to work out some new decks with them.

[Gilberreke]

Yeah, I suppose it depends entirely on the meta. I've personally just not seen decks using sweepers for death triggers too often before; The ones I see are generally based on some sort of sac outlet, so you can have more fine control. I do tend to completely ignore whatever the opponent is doing to set up my side, though, so I'm far from the best source on these things, lol

Thing is, white weenie needs to be blazingly fast, that's why I took out any birds above 2 mana and added spell cost reduction. If you happen to know a card that allows for better sacs than Seaside Haven, I'm all ears :). Thing is, it's not pumping out enough birds fast enough to warrant sacs. Most birds just die from natural causes, it's rare that the deck needs to sac birds to get counters. Just go kamikaze and attack and block them to death seems to work :).

Maybe Martyr's Cause is something this deck can use? 3 mana is a bit steep though and I think I don't need any damage prevention really, unless I use it to keep my Soulcatchers alive. Sac a bird, keep Soulcatcher alive, Soulcatcher gets +1/+1. If there's an Aerie, all birds get +1/+1, meaning Soulcatcher gets +2/+2 for this move.

Sounds do-able.

What about Mask of the Mimic? Kill a bird, regain a bird, gain +1 on your Aeries. Might be reasonable.
Drowned Rusalka is feasible, but doesn't really fit the bird tribal theme. At that point, I might as well just throw in stronger tribes.
Perilous Research is a possibility
Read the Runes is probably what you would use.
Ashnod's Altar is a classic :)

As for other cards, Aether Barrier turns the deck into more of a control deck. Nasty for the opponent, allows you to exchange birds, amassing counters. My deck isn't fast enough for this card, unless I add extra drawing ability though.

I think I'm going to playtest Aether Barrier and Read the Runes

[BinoAl]

Thing is, white weenie needs to be blazingly fast, that's why I took out any birds above 2 mana and added spell cost reduction. If you happen to know a card that allows for better sacs than Seaside Haven, I'm all ears :). Thing is, it's not pumping out enough birds fast enough to warrant sacs. Most birds just die from natural causes, it's rare that the deck needs to sac birds to get counters. Just go kamikaze and attack and block them to death seems to work :).

Maybe Martyr's Cause is something this deck can use? 3 mana is a bit steep though and I think I don't need any damage prevention really, unless I use it to keep my Soulcatchers alive. Sac a bird, keep Soulcatcher alive, Soulcatcher gets +1/+1. If there's an Aerie, all birds get +1/+1, meaning Soulcatcher gets +2/+2 for this move.

Sounds do-able.

What about Mask of the Mimic? Kill a bird, regain a bird, gain +1 on your Aeries. Might be reasonable.
Drowned Rusalka is feasible, but doesn't really fit the bird tribal theme. At that point, I might as well just throw in stronger tribes.
Perilous Research is a possibility
Read the Runes is probably what you would use.
Ashnod's Altar is a classic :)

As for other cards, Aether Barrier turns the deck into more of a control deck. Nasty for the opponent, allows you to exchange birds, amassing counters. My deck isn't fast enough for this card, unless I add extra drawing ability though.

I think I'm going to playtest Aether Barrier and Read the Runes

Yeah, I think Martyr's Cause would work pretty well with the deck. It makes your birds effectively pumped in terms of blocking, since the opponent has to assume they're all a bit stronger, seeing as you could simply sac a bird for a profitable block. Mask of the Mimic is a one-time sac, and I wasn't as into that as something repeatable. It IS a death trigger along with a replacement for cheap, though, so it could work. Drowned Rusalka is a decent sac outlet, but it costs mana to activate, and it's a non-bird creature, which is something that absolutely irks me in tribal decks ;) Perilous Research suffers from the same drawbacks as Mask of the Mimic, in that it's one-time use. However, you draw 2, and this deck probably does want a bit of draw to it, with the Weenie theme. Vivisection is in the same vein as Perilous Research, but is more cards and more mana. Read the Runes would be beautiful in this deck, though. I would definitely use it :) The problem with Ashnod's Alter is that you won't be using colorless mana, with all the cost reduction. Aether barrier could work, but I think it's a bit too pricey mana-wise for the effect. It doesn't hurt the opponent *too* much, it would generally just slow down a well curved deck by a turn.

This may be one of the best thread hijacks ever.

On topic, though, I haven't played much of MtG in years. I've got a good twenty decks in a box somewhere that my dad originally set up in the mid 90's that he gave to me, but that box is buried somewhere in my office.

I'm sure it'll turn up soon, but when it does I'm definitely gonna have to work out some new decks with them.

Heh, the OP is banned, so I don't feel particularly guilty ;)
If that box has cards from '92-'94, you could make some good money from it. Specifically, Black Lotus, anything with "Mox", Time Walk, Ancestral Recall, or Timetwister would be worth a ton

[Azdoine]

If that box has cards from '92-'94, you could make some good money from it. Specifically, Black Lotus, anything with "Mox", Time Walk, Ancestral Recall, or Timetwister would be worth a ton

It's just too bad they're banned in a lot of formats (and by my casual playgroup).