Board 8 > Magic the Gathering: Kaldheim spoiler season etc

(+) Yeah! (+)

I noticed the old topic purged and figured I'd start a new one if anyone is interested.

So with Vega, the Watcher, Saw it Coming, etc and the U/W pathway coming in Kaldheim I can see the return of U/W control as a real possibility. Thankfully WotC seems to have learned from recent sets and made the card draw engine (Vega) a legendary card.

On a non-Kaldheim note I was playing Omniscience draft and got a pack 1 pick 1 Peer into the Abyss. What a ridiculous card in the format. My first game I had it in my opening hand and ended up with more than 20 power on board and I stripped my opponent's hand with a Bad Deal and a Mind Rot. With a Cancel in hand I literally won the game before my opponent even got a turn.

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Not sure how the Kaldheim cards will shake things up but honestly I think U/W Control right now even is really underrated. I like it more than the Esper Doom Foretold decks that are running around for sure. Admittedly I don't think any full control build is a top tier deck right now, but yeah. (Unless you count Rogues as a control deck which I am not in this context)

Also I've been doing more Zendikar Rising draft and I actually really like the format once you learn what the archetypes are.
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I've got a U/W control deck I've played a little on Arena and it's alright, but it comes up a bit short of what you'd want for the archetype. I think the absolute worst feeling game I had with it was one where my opponent played one of my Dream Trawlers and completely stomped me with it. The deck needs something a little more, especially the f'ing Pathway. It has a lot of good tools, but it takes a lot more to put the game away than I care for.

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The foretell cards seem really strong to me. Still waiting on the inevitable foretell wrath, but the counter and draw spell are already a great start.

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I'm a little concerned, but hopefully I'm just being melodramatic

The foretell control deck looks like cancer

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the giant that is basically Sulfuric Vortex while its in your graveyard if you have a giant seems like it could be very good

I want to see some cheap changelings to pair with jt
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The Thor card is pretty hype.

Also, Phyrexian language Vorinclex mmm.

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Mystical Reflection has soooo much potential.

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Maybe weird question but is there any good resource I can use to get info on the lore of MtG? It seems interesting, but I'm somewhat at a loss for how to approach catching up on lore when coming in relatively new to a 30 year old card game.
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Fun weird cards this set

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pyresword posted...

Maybe weird question but is there any good resource I can use to get info on the lore of MtG? It seems interesting, but I'm somewhat at a loss for how to approach catching up on lore when coming in relatively new to a 30 year old card game.

There's a lot of lore in the game. Your main options are Magic Stories (https://mtg.fandom.com/wiki/Magic_Story) and the books (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Magic:_The_Gathering_novels). I'd say pick a plane/story and go from there.

Alternatively, you could start with the Gatewatch stuff from Magic Origins onwards.

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You could also try the Fantasy Geographic youtube channel for MtG lore: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdQSoDdF2MR49D-kciFnDsw

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I enjoy a lot of the character- focused videos that Magic Arcanum has on their channel

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Nothing better than topdecking the perfect card when your back is against wall.

Am currently playing Historic Goblins in the MTGA qualifier weekend and am on 2 losses. My opponent was playing some sort of Green/White midrange deck I'd never seen before. I'm not sure how good it is against the field at large, but they sideboarded (presumably) into Linvala Keeper of Silence as well as Kinjalli's Sunwing which both shut down my deck hard. 1-2 turns before their board was going to get too out of hand I draw Shatterskull Smashing to kill both of the above creatures and tap my Krenko that had done nothing almost all match to swing for game.

Looking at MTG Goldfish I can see several similar looking decks so I'm guessing this is a legit deck and I just never had run into it before, which is entirely possible considering I basically started playing Historic 2 weeks ago. (for example https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/3688002#paper)
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Doomskar is crazy. Wrath the board for 3? Yes please, but only if I'm playing it thank you.

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Yeah Doomskar seems good. I've been somewhat lukewarm on foretell so far and have thought it wouldn't see much use outside of limited. Doomskar definitely tilting the needle away from that direction though, and I know there were at least 2-3 other solid ones also. I kind of hope foretell does see a lot of play since I just like control in general and think it seems neat.

I'm also actually quite excited about the Green/Black elf deck that seems to be a thing. I don't think I'll really be able to predict if it will be standard playable until people actually try it, but I really hope it is. There's also a potential for some really amusing infect synergy with Fynn, the Fangbearer and cards like Elvish Warmaster or Binding the Old Gods, though I have a feeling that aspect specifically might be a bit too gimmicky/situational to actually see serious play.
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Doomskar might single handed make other foretell cards playable by also being used as a doomskar bluff.

You know the Aggro player who curved 1 drop into 2 drop is going to just be staring at that exiled card

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I think foretell is going to be pretty strong all things said, at least in a control deck. The counter, wrath and draw spell are all extremely good.

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So as opposed to say, Ikoria where my first 5 drafts were something stupid like 33-3, I am currently 2-6 in drafts

Not sure what is going on with this format.

My initial guess is that it is a more luck based draft format based on how many insane 2 color bombs there are at uncommon which means your exact two color combination matters, but not quite sure yet

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On that note MY P2 Pick 3, 4, and 5 were all the same tapped spell land Gates of Istafell

What the hell

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my first draft I went 7 - 0. I got 3 copies of the uncommon red bear that gets a +1/+1 counter whenever you boast and three copies of the 3 drop that lets you boast for 1 to play the top card of your deck for the turn

also my first pick was the rare R/W saga which seems pretty strong if you have a low mana curve. It was like a draw 4 for 4 that also gave out some +1/+1 counters. Its great.
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Just had an opponent crack their 7 mana destroy a land create a troll land on me using all their mana

...

When I had the legendary shield that prevents 1 damage and counters all spells unless the opponen pays 1

Instant shame concede

Side note: Sheild has MASSIVELY overperformed. Thought I would be playing the angel most often but won two games on the back of the opponents army of 2/X's did basically nothing

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Welp. 2nd draft of the format and I got Koma, Cosmos Serpent. What a "fun" limited card. I was already in green and blue when it showed up also so it was perfect. My rare in the first pack was Battle Mammoth which is also kind of a bomb itself that I was really excited about even if it's playing second fiddle now >.>

Remains to be seen how well I actually do with the deck especially considering I'm kinda not great at limited, but I think this should be able to carry me to a somewhat decent record at least. (am currently 1-0)

edit: 3 games so far. 2 where my opponent immediately scooped once Koma hit the field and a third where I lost because my opponent stole my Koma with Trickster God's Heist. Definitely a fun card >.>
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pyresword posted...

Welp. 2nd draft of the format and I got Koma, Cosmos Serpent. What a "fun" limited card. I was already in green and blue when it showed up also so it was perfect. My rare in the first pack was Battle Mammoth which is also kind of a bomb itself that I was really excited about even if it's playing second fiddle now >.>

Remains to be seen how well I actually do with the deck especially considering I'm kinda not great at limited, but I think this should be able to carry me to a somewhat decent record at least. (am currently 1-0)

edit: 3 games so far. 2 where my opponent immediately scooped once Koma hit the field and a third where I lost because my opponent stole my Koma with Trickster God's Heist. Definitely a fun card >.>

Eh, its a 7 mana card that can still be answered. Its good, but its not dreamtrawler, good or anything like that

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0-3 from aggro BW sealed
3-3 from a really bad aggro RW draft
2-3 from what i thought was an incredible BW draft, i had so many of the rare angels and synergy out the ass, tons of life gain, i had 2 of the 4 mana exiles, 2 of the 3 mana pacify, and 2 of the destroy tapped creature; but i got run over twice and out-valued once. Felt really bad.

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So far I'm:

0-3 with a kinda not great RG midrange deck. Think I didn't take enough high end stuff. Did hurt that I pulled the 2 drop boast dude who makes 5/5 dragons and never drew it though. I did get mana screwed one game where I probably would have won, but I'm still not sure the deck was that good.

4-3 with Koma deck I alluded to above, which was a Sultai snow control deck. Never drew Koma after the first 3 games despite going through 3/4 of my library in 2 of them. The deck still functioned without it but it was a lot more fair. Flooded pretty badly the 2 other games I lost but maybe you can blame that on deck construction since I was running 17 lands, 3 elves that tap to make mana, and 2 Glittering Frost.
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This doesnt surprise me at all



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3-3 with RW aggro. I had a Cosmos Elixer that maybe didn't fit the deck, but it was quite good.

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Maybe I've gotten a little unlucky in my drafts so far, but it feels like there's less removal this set than the previous few. I'm having trouble getting more than like 1 piece per deck. Is that anyone else's experience?

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The Mana Sword posted...

Maybe I've gotten a little unlucky in my drafts so far, but it feels like there's less removal this set than the previous few. I'm having trouble getting more than like 1 piece per deck. Is that anyone else's experience?

I think the commons of this set are unusually bad which makes it hard for good drafters to beat bad drafters through skill. I've seen multiple packs with 14 cards with it where I was thoroughly unimpressed. Combine that with the 2 color cards being exceptionally strong and you have a really luck based format.

Its still been kind of interesting, but it really has felt like more drafts have been trainwrecks than usual in formats.

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Has anyone been playing on mobile yet? Im still waiting because of course I have an iPhone.

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I played a couple of games to test it out but the interface is really small. It's definitely more playable than I thought it would be but still not as good as I'd like. It might be good to ladder with on some or most decks but I wouldn't want to be playing drafts on it.

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Well, bought a draft box to play sealed with my son. It solidified some of my feelings towards this set.

First 6 packs were complete trash and resulted in what was the worst sealed deck I had ever put together. 20 C level cards and 3 Bs or so.

Second deck had MUCH better cards, and I was sure it was going to blow the first deck out.... until I realized I could not find more than 17 cards of two colors. The packs were super strong, but the strong cards were all gold cards of random color combinations I couldnt touch and had no fixing for. Ended up with my last few picks being complete draft unplayable and splashing two cards off of nothing more than a single dual land.

I really think this is going to be the worst limited format since the return to return to Ravnica sets

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This set seems atrocious for sealed just because snow is immediately removed from viability in 90% of pools. The set seems extremely synergy focused so your sealed pools are going to be trash a lot of the time.

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I haven't been playing for long but I already like it at least much more than drafting Ikoria which was probably the least fun experience I've had in any TCG.

I definitely don't like it as much as Zendikar Rising draft, but that also felt like an exceptionally good limited format to me.
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Did my first draft and started red/green with the first pack and got passed a Koma in pack two so I just splashed a bit of blue. Both times I've played it so far got instant concedes from my opponent, so nice.

I'll agree that the commons aren't very great though. Some packs are so underwhelming.

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Standard set drafts since GRN Id probably go.

RNA > ZNR > IKO > ELD > M21 > GRN > M20 > THB > WAR


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@masterplum I think that maybe you should consider an alternative to "woe is me, everyone else is getting lucky with their drafts." This set is teeming with cards that can make a third color more than a splash (hint - snow can make an unintuitive "basic land" pick into a game winner). If the set is as shallow on picks as you're claiming, then you really should be winning. If the set really is as you describe then "good drafters" should actually have the advantage over bad drafters due to their skill, since overall everyone will regularly get bad cards. My guess as to why you're not doing as well as you think you really really, really deserve to is that you are auto-passing on a lot of high value cards simply because they would be low value in other sets. AKA, you're playing poorly.

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eh I've had a lot of drafts not go so well either for similar reasons. Plum is overstating compared to my experience but I definitely found it's harder to get a good deck together than say Zendikar Rising or Ikoria which are the 2 formats I have the most experience in. (Ikoria I mainly hate because I don't like the mechanics)

Aggressively taking snow lands with the idea of making some kind of 3 color deck work seems better than conventional wisdom might suggest so far though.
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Everybody has drafts that don't go the way they want. Even the best pro players can get fucked over in a draft. The thing is that everyone has access to the same cards. Luck will always have a part to play in MTG, but bitching about it suggests more about you than the game.

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I mean. last season I was in Diamond. I don't think I'm playing poorly

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Question for people who are more experienced in limited that I am:

How do you play/think about hands that have say 3 lands but all in 1 color? Assume you have a typical 2-color deck. Also let's say that you can cast 2-3 of your spells on a decent curve even if you don't draw the other color of land since probably I'm going to mulligan a hand with like 3 Swamps and then 4 red cards. But in the case I described it seems very borderline and I just don't know what the play is. I hate keeping hands that only have 1 color of land but also mulligan-ing at all just feels really really bad to me in limited even if you mulligan into a good 6 card hand. (At least this type of limited. I suppose if I'm playing like MTGO vintage cube it's probably a different story)

Yes I am asking because I kept a hand like I just described above (ie. 3 Swamps, 3 black cards with cost 2-4, and a red card) and then drew red cards on each of the first 3 turns and was very sad, but I'm not especially convinced I made the wrong decision.
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pyresword posted...

Question for people who are more experienced in limited that I am:

How do you play/think about hands that have say 3 lands but all in 1 color? Assume you have a typical 2-color deck. Also let's say that you can cast 2-3 of your spells on a decent curve even if you don't draw the other color of land since probably I'm going to mulligan a hand with like 3 Swamps and then 4 red cards. But in the case I described it seems very borderline and I just don't know what the play is. I hate keeping hands that only have 1 color of land but also mulligan-ing at all just feels really really bad to me in limited even if you mulligan into a good 6 card hand. (At least this type of limited. I suppose if I'm playing like MTGO vintage cube it's probably a different story)

Yes I am asking because I kept a hand like I just described above (ie. 3 Swamps, 3 black cards with cost 2-4, and a red card) and then drew red cards on each of the first 3 turns and was very sad, but I'm not especially convinced I made the wrong decision.

I always feel kinda hesitant keeping a hand with only one colour when I'm playing a two colour deck. If it's the case you just said I would've probably kept it, especially if I was on the draw since there's more chances of drawing red. Really does come down to chance though.

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I want to clarify I don't care I'm losing. I've just been confused why it's been happening. I've just been posting my theory

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pyresword posted...

Question for people who are more experienced in limited that I am:

How do you play/think about hands that have say 3 lands but all in 1 color? Assume you have a typical 2-color deck. Also let's say that you can cast 2-3 of your spells on a decent curve even if you don't draw the other color of land since probably I'm going to mulligan a hand with like 3 Swamps and then 4 red cards. But in the case I described it seems very borderline and I just don't know what the play is. I hate keeping hands that only have 1 color of land but also mulligan-ing at all just feels really really bad to me in limited even if you mulligan into a good 6 card hand. (At least this type of limited. I suppose if I'm playing like MTGO vintage cube it's probably a different story)

Yes I am asking because I kept a hand like I just described above (ie. 3 Swamps, 3 black cards with cost 2-4, and a red card) and then drew red cards on each of the first 3 turns and was very sad, but I'm not especially convinced I made the wrong decision.

In the case you described I will almost always keep the hand. Youre describing a 6 card hand essentially with all playables, which isnt going to drastically improve by mulliganing. If its like 3 swamps and then a bunch of cards you cant play until turn 4-5, then yeah, Ill toss it back.

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