Lurker > pyresword

Well day 2 was...odd.

The draft phase went absolutely horribly, to the point that I was maindecking Smashing Success and Vault Robber, but I still managed to scrape together a 2-2 finish due to getting paired against some very greedy snow decks against which Smashing Success was a bit of a silver bullet. It's a bit disappointing to miss after getting as close as I did to the 2nd draft, even though this deck had no business getting even 1 win.

And yeah I kind of hate sealed in general but I more or less treat at least the day 1's like casual events in the first place.

Well then. I had all kinds of gold and gems saved up for the Arena Open and then I ended up going 7-1 on my first attempt. ...guess I've already got a lot for next time then?

Used a Red/Green deck sort-of built around Waking the Trolls and then ended up only drawing the card in 2 of my games, 1 of which my opponent was already dead on-board that turn anyways. Turns out just getting strong red removal options and haste creatures was enough.

Kaldheim draft is up right now, probably because of the Arena Open, and I forgot how much I liked this limited format.

Does anyone actually play Alchemy? Really struggling with what deck to run for the qualifier event this weekend. If in doubt I'll just play Rakdos Anvil, but it feels wrong and you just know that everyone is going to come prepared for it. Kind of want to run some deck using Divine Purge and Farewell but any deck I've tried just feels too weak.

Man I've been having fun looping Time Walks but it feels so bad to do it when the matchmaker for some reason decides to pair me as a high mythic player against someone in bronze 3 using one of the Arena starter decks

I saw people in Historic getting decent value out of Oracle of the Alpha by using it in conjunction with Narset, Parter of Veils and Wandering Mind. So yeah I would say that's pretty much a fair analysis.

I don't think it's a card you just use though and I don't see it as being that strong on it's own. Even in the constructed deck I was talking about Displacer Kitten is the real engine.

masterplum posted...

Is oracle of the alpha even good?

In a vacuum not really. The deck I had is a combo deck where most of the work is done by Displacer Kitten and Saiba Syphoner. Oracle of the Alpha just means that once you get everything set up you just absolutely go off, but I'm not convinced the deck even needs it. The combo of Kitten+Syphoner basically means that every time you cast a spell you can also blink the Syphoner, which means you can do things like repeatedly loop Fading Hope to bounce your opponent's entire board and lock them out of the game. Oracle of the Alpha helps because the Mox's also give you extra Kitten triggers which means every Mox basically draws you a card, so you're often just ending the game on the spot if you untap with Kitten and a sufficient density of power 9 cards in your deck. Looping Time Walk is also the most straightforward way to win.

This is nearly the deck I was using and Altheriax has more detailed explanations and a better understanding of the deck. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aCt13DheKGs

I don't have a great sense for how strong the deck really is but I can at least say it's viable.

I've been playing Alchemy since that is the format for the Mythic Qualifier next month, and I'm here to report that running Displacer Kitten and Oracle of the Alpha is definitely a recipe for reasonable and honest games of Magic the Gathering.

I generally like the Arena Opens, but I'm already bad at Limited in general and the Arena Cube specifically I have no experience at all in, so I'd probably just be wasting resources.

Actually though tbh I didn't realize exactly how Aetherflux Reservoir works. If you've got to go through the loop enough times to be able to pay 100 life (as opposed to just 50+12 or whatever) then maybe they get screwed over by the Arena timer even if there's no real card mechanics preventing them from doing it.

I haven't really played outside of Arena much but I thought the Pioneer Green Devotion deck (which now matches the Explorer version) had a true infinite with the Cauldron. Was this something else or did they just screw up by not realizing you had access to instant speed lifegain and not manually going through the loop enough times to account for that?

Edit: I stand a bit corrected because Arena is still missing Oath of Nissa, but I don't think that matters for this specific context

For the record I don't have anything resembling an informed guess as to how it actually did; I just think dunking on Wizards is funny especially with a product as obscenely bad as this one.

https://cardboard-crack.com/post/702202299319271424/30th-anniversary-edition

Haven't had much time to really dive into limited, but I did play some Constructed with the new cards and managed to go 7-0 at my first attempt at the Standard Metagame Challenge on Arena. I was playing Mono-white midrange/control with the new card doing an impression of Swords to Plowshares. This archetype was already low-key pretty good in the last set and it feels incredibly strong now.

Decided to give Blue Lock a try and am almost caught up to the weekly release. I think this show is probably a bit too edgy for its own good but it's reasonably fun at least.

I disagree with the notion that you can generally tell how good a story is by reading a synopsis, but regardless I think the strength of Death Note is in the directing and the presentation. It's good because it's able to maintain a suspenseful and tense atmosphere which keeps the viewer invested.

It's a very exciting thriller.

I don't know exactly what impression you have of it but it plays out more like a high-stakes detective show than anything else I think.

To be clear I wouldn't call it the best anime ever or anything but I do think it's high tier for sure.

On the one hand yes Apollo is a bit more obscure but on the other hand his last name is literally justice.

Is anyone else planning on nominating Trails From Zero for this? I'm interested in putting in a list, but it's a situation where the list of songs I'd personally be willing to use is a bit small and probably doesn't overlap well with the list of songs other fans of the ost would want to see. So it's probably better if I back off in the event someone else was planning a more typical nomination.

GenesisSaga posted...

mid but exceedingly overrated

This describes the genre more than the specific show tbqh

Noragami a great show, though I agree on not liking Nora much which is a bit unfortunate for some arcs.

I got called once for jury duty, but I was able to get out of it apparently by just telling them that I was a grad student. I think the rule is designed for people who are taking classes, which I didn't really do anymore, but I'm certainly not going to complain. It was also right during the 1st summer of the pandemic so the idea made me quite nervous.

Raven in the Inner Palace is my favorite show I'm watching this season also. Which admittedly I'm only watching 3, but still.

I should actually finish Wheel of Time at some point ever. Realistically I could start from book 11 but I know I'm going to forget everything but also if I start from the beginning I'm just going to get bogged down in the middle again and stop somewhere. Idk.

Speaking of things I should finish I will get back to Xenoblade 2...eventually. I've been way too busy with work the past few weeks but I'm hoping that should be over by next week.

Bang Dream game is ok from the story side of things. There's a fair amount of actual good content that unfortunately gets diluted by just nonsense event stories. Don't really think I'd like the anime though. At the end of the day it's still the gameplay holding my interest in the mobile game, and also Poppin Party is one of the weaker bands imo. (From the story side, love their songs though)

Best character is Chisato, though I'm guessing she barely appears in the anime. Arisa is great to though.

Oh ok I misunderstood something then. That's fine.

NFUN posted...

you'll only be able to support one set from the same game though, so you might get out-competed.

This is all but guaranteed if I actually do this.

Petition to allow multiple submissions from the same game either in this or future bost contests if they happen. I am basically not motivated to nominate anything this year because it's either exactly the same thing I nominated last time or a case where I feel I'll have to bend over backwards to avoid upsetting other fans of the soundtrack and end up with a list I don't even like myself.

I liked Rokka a lot. Shame that it basically died though yeah.

Some day I will watch the rest of Kongming. The first 2 episodes were very good though >.>

I will say I glanced at the post again...based on things like placement in the text, etc, I think it's most likely to be a thing from early in the show.

Scorching Ping Pong Girls was a lot of fun. It really surprised because I was just expecting it to be kind of bad honestly. Definitely agree it needed more seasons though.

Season 3 is generally the most popular part, I think?

My favorite parts were seasons 2-4 for sure. I've only watched about half of S5, but my impression of the manga content of seasons 5 and 6 is that it's a step down but still pretty good, with some great moments. It's the stuff after where it really starts to fall off for me.

I really liked the early parts of MHA but man has the final act of the manga soured my impression of the series as a whole.

Kurisu is a 10/10 character and also could be something like my 4th favorite from the series...

#1 is Okabe easily, and then some order of Kurisu/Mayuri/Maho who are all amazing. (Maho is a Steins;Gate 0 character, which I can't tell if you've watched or read from the write-up.)

It feels like Death Note isn't as big now as it used to be, but I still consider it one of the best thriller anime out there. The last arc of the show isn't great, but I wouldn't say I dislike it either.

I also thought Lucoa was pretty terrible.

Decently fun show, though it's definitely one of those "I don't get the hype" shows for me. I like Kobayashi and the Tohru/Elma stuff from season 2.

Leonhart4 posted...

ED1 is the worst of the bunch

Excuse me this is false but yes they are all bangers.

I have my strategically idiotic setlist of 7 favorites from a game I'll nominate on the last day if nobody else picks it first >.>

I don't think Fable should be banned either, to be clear. (Though I certainly wouldn't complain if it was, just because I hate the card)

In a vacuum judging by the individual cards, the only one I'd even consider is Fable of the Mirror Breaker. That said, I do think they more or less made a good ban because I think metagame diversity is something Wizards should always have been factoring into their ban decisions, even though it seems at odds with their previous philosophy on the matter. Bans should be tools, not desperation measures.

Massacre as an individual card is nowhere near ban-worthy. I can get behind the ban with the reasoning of "black decks as a whole are too ubiquitous so we want to ban something, and hitting Meathook might allow more archetypes to emerge".

Sorry I shouldn't phrase that to mean that nobody on reddit/twitter is trustworthy. What I mean is that if *twitter user with name I don't recognize* starts complaining about things like translation quality or whatever for a Trails release I'm just going to roll my eyes.

UshiromiyaEva posted...

So I haven't played this yet, and nobody has posted really since it came out, but I hear this is....not the best release?

I have no idea but I absolutely would never trust the general Trails fanbase to rationally arrive at this conclusion.

If specific people (ie. not "person on reddit/twitter") are pointing out specific, concrete problems then that's another story.

Aria one of the all-time greats imo. I also don't know if I can really describe why I liked it as much as I did though. It's just a very uplifting show and it had this way of creating adventure out of just ordinary life with a really fun cast of characters.

Honestly I shouldn't have opened that the way I did even though the experience was bad for me. As I said there's a clear artistic direction which in some sense is a good thing and more than many anime can claim. The issue is that in terms of viewer experiences the worst ones tend to not be things that are just passively boring; they tend to be things where writers take artistic risks that don't pay off for that particular viewer.

(Yes, I'm sure there's some truly awful stuff out there that's just bad through-and-through like EX-ARM or some of the other infamously terrible anime, but I tend to just stay away from those entirely)

Watched some episode 1's. (And episode 2 also in the case of Raven of the Inner Palace)

Raven of the Inner Palace: Given the mysterious nature of the story I think it's hard to say much concrete, but I've been liking it quite a bit so far. Story is intriguing, and the characters seem like they have a lot of potential.

Management of a Novice Alchemist: This don't expect this to be making waves or anything, but I thought episode 1 was pretty fun. Given the introductory nature of the first episode I don't know how indicative that is of the rest of the show, but all signs are good so far. The protagonist seems pretty fun.

Akiba Maid War: Strong contender for worst episode 1 ever and honestly I don't know what else is even in the running. This is probably a drop, but there's some clear talent and intent with the artistic direction in the show, so I'm willing to give it one more episode. The idea behind the show seems cool, but the decision to make the protagonist an innocent girl with no idea what's going on and dedicating the episode to traumatizing her is just an absolutely fatal flaw that makes the entire experience one enormous pit of toxicity and negativity. Absolutely awful.

Tsubasa Tiger in first as it should be.

My feelings about the series are weird but overall I guess it's pretty great. Second Season in particular is just basically all fantastic arcs.

I will say that I think Monogatari is more esoteric than it is actually deep or profound. It's hard to follow more for the sake of being hard to follow than because there's any meat to the ideas its trying to communicate. (Well I mean there is some depth to it compared to the average anime, but yeah)

Yeah I haven't seen any of Call of the Night. I only meant that statement in a general sense.

I tend to make that complaint also if it's overly centralizing to the show. It's probably arguable that my real issue sometimes is a lack of other things about the show that interest me, but idk

Made in Abyss season 2 beated.

This series is incredibly good. Think I liked this more than season 1, though it's a bit hard to say. It's really impressive how the series has managed to shift the types of stories it's trying to tell while still having everything feel like it fits together in the bigger picture.

I do wish they did a bit more with Vueko towards the end, but oh well.

Index was good fun even if I didn't like it quite as much as Railgun, and some arcs are actually really good.

Until season 3 but I prefer to pretend that does not exist.

Yeah idk. I tend to like work drama stories, but the way it's described makes it sound like bad work drama. Just another reason not to go back to the series I guess >.>

Also apparently I forgot to comment on Land of the Lustrous but I more or less agree. Show was pretty good but it felt so incomplete in a way that even most other incomplete anime adaptations don't. I tried reading the manga and loved some of it but eventually lost interest, though I don't know if that's the manga's fault or my fault. (I'm just very bad at absorbing and comprehending information when it's presented in manga form for some reason, which is problematic for a series like this...)

I thought Aquatope had a really strong 1st episode and then just immediately stopped caring about it after that. Not totally sure why, though I will say that I did not like the "fantasy"(?) aspect of this show at all. I'm pretty confident I would like the 2nd half more but alas I never made it there.