Magic The Gathering Thread XXIII: Modern is Dead, Long Live Modern

[Zhentarim]

Meaning no offense, this thread is not about your political or philosophical inclinations, and continued discussion about colour philosophy seems kind of dumb when I mostly just want to... talk about playing the actual damn game.

Anyone got some cards from Dominaria they're excited for? I'm interested in Artificer's Assistant. Looks like it could be surprisingly powerful in the right deck.

I had made my own thread JUST for discussing the philosophy of the colors, but it got merged into this one for some reason.

ANYWAY, I’m completely new to the game...never actually played before, but I want to play it now that I know some of the lore.

This one organization I escaped from was obsessed with “unity” which is why white/green leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

[Turalisj]

Meaning no offense, this thread is not about your political or philosophical inclinations, and continued discussion about colour philosophy seems kind of dumb when I mostly just want to... talk about playing the actual damn game.

Anyone got some cards from Dominaria they're excited for? I'm interested in Artificer's Assistant. Looks like it could be surprisingly powerful in the right deck.

I'm plotting up a tax deck and a monogreen elf deck at the moment..... And abzan saprolings.

[Zhentarim]

I'm plotting up a tax deck and a monogreen elf deck at the moment..... And abzan saprolings.

saprolines. Are they good?

[Turalisj]

At the moment, no, but we're getting some better support for them.

[Fable Wright]

At the moment, no, but we're getting some better support for them.

The loss of spore counters is a tragedy, as Time Spiral's support for the tribe is incompatible with Dominaria's. Sporecrown Thallid and Fungal Plots are kinda interesting, but not particularly the support Thallids needed. Sadly.

[tgva8889]

Sagas all look awesome. But I'm weird and all the cards I'm most excited about are uncommon, because I have an uncommon cube and they really pushed the kinds of effects uncommon gets in this set because there's so many legends.

[Dhavaer]

Anyone got some cards from Dominaria they're excited for? I'm interested in Artificer's Assistant. Looks like it could be surprisingly powerful in the right deck.

Teferi. I like the idea of a planeswalker that works well with a draw-go style deck.

[Turalisj]

Sagas all look awesome. But I'm weird and all the cards I'm most excited about are uncommon, because I have an uncommon cube and they really pushed the kinds of effects uncommon gets in this set because there's so many legends.

I like the theory that they were initially going to be Masterpieces in this set, but after the Invocations blew back on them, they downshifted the rarity of some cards.

[tgva8889]

Masterpiece Series is mostly reprints, though, so I don't see how that could have been the case. Maybe they changed some of the cards. The frame treatment Sagas got isn't really different enough for masterpieces, though. I honestly just think they didn't intend to do them for Dominaria, it was far enough away from Amonkhet that they got to see how that didn't work and just didn't do them.

[Ebon_Drake]

Now that you mention it, I'm actually really surprised that Dominaria doesn't have a Masterpieces series. I was never a fan of the concept and knew it'd be unsustainable when it was announced that every expansion would have masterpieces shoehorned in, but the key issues with the Amonkhet ones were a combination of a fugly, unreadable design and a lack of a clear overarching theme to link the cards together (HOD was much better on the second point). Canning them for Ixalan was the right call IMO, but if any set seems like a natural fit for a Masterpiece series it'd be the return to the original home of Magic on the 25th anniversary of the game, in a set with a history theme and full of legendary cards. A Masterpiece series reprinting popular legends from Dominaria's past (well, those that aren't on the Reserved List anyway) seems like a natural fit.

All I can guess is either Dominaria already had enough going on, it was already stretching their pack collation tech with the "legend in every pack" gimmick, or reaction to the Amonkhet ones was bad enough to turn WOTC off the concept completely. Or maybe it would've been running too close to the Time Spiral timeshifted cards?

[Silfir]

Seems to be an unfortunate pattern with Wizards at times - they come up with a good/not necessarily bad idea, start screwing it up, and take the public dissatisfaction as their cue to scrap the idea altogether, rather than stop screwing up.

Be it misguided masterpiece design in a set that has no thematical connection to them, Duel Decks that feel like 60-card Sealed decks or Masters designed around being drafted that are just too expensive/lacking in value for people to afford drafting them.

[Ninjaman]

Enslave is a Planar Chaos card, so it basically doesn't exist for the purposes of color pie arguments (Mark Rosewater taken as the authority here).

It was reprinted in New Phyrexia.

[Zhentarim]

are werewolf decks strong?

[Svata]

Not particularly. They have a handful of good cards (hello, Huntmaster of the Fells, nice to see you) but they don't have super strong tribal synergies, so you're better off just building a Gruul or Jund deck and including a couple of the good werewolves. The tribal deck of choice these days is Humans.

[Yaktan]

I am currently trying to come up with a deck built around Tiana and artifact sac effects. May or may not work, but I want to try.

[Bucky]

Not particularly. They have a handful of good cards (hello, Huntmaster of the Fells, nice to see you) but they don't have super strong tribal synergies, so you're better off just building a Gruul or Jund deck and including a couple of the good werewolves. The tribal deck of choice these days is Humans.

If you wish, you can slip the Mayor of Avabruck + Lambholt Pacifist package into your tribal Humans deck, and maybe the Huntmaster. A couple of the Humans deck's key synergy pieces, Thalia's Lieutenant and Champion of the Parish, only care about type when the creature enters the battlefield.

Duskwatch Recruiter is also independently viable, but not in a low land-count tribal aggro deck.

[tgva8889]

It was reprinted in New Phyrexia.

That doesn't necessarily mean anything. New Phyrexia also bent and broke the color pie a lot, and basically took it out back and shot it in the head when they made Phyrexian mana.

[Androgeus]

Black is tertiary in creature stealing, so it gets it rarely and usually conditionally.

[Ninjaman]

That doesn't necessarily mean anything. New Phyrexia also bent and broke the color pie a lot, and basically took it out back and shot it in the head when they made Phyrexian mana.

It broke the color pie by making everything black, not by making black everything.
Black does creature stealing occasionally, it is part of black's color pie.

[solidork]

I really want to try and abuse Sagas with flickering or by removing counters with Hex Parasite or Clockspinning.

[Svata]

Black can do anything but deal with artifacts/enchantments. It's just second-best, and rather greedy to do it. Has the second-best card draw, but you have to pay life. Second-best creature quality, but it has like 3-4 black pips in the cost. It's only non-greedy thing is removal, which is still generally second-best in terms of efficiency, though with less drawbacks. (StP and Path say hello. Bolt used to, but Fatal Push exists now.)

[Zhentarim]

If white is the weakest, is it a challenge to win with monowhite?

[LansXero]

there is no 'weakest', and the challenge, such as it would be, would come from the deck, rather than whatever color it is.

[Zhentarim]

there is no 'weakest', and the challenge, such as it would be, would come from the deck, rather than whatever color it is.

What is the weakest deck, then?

[Emmerlaus]

What is the weakest deck, then?

Any decks without coherence or purpose could be weak. You can’t name one as being the weakest . Starters decks could maybe fit Though.

[LansXero]

What is the weakest deck, then?

60 basic lands standard. Its legal, does nothing.

Did you attend Open House this weekend? You could've gotten a free deck out of it, and actually play the game for a bit.

[Zhentarim]

60 basic lands standard. Its legal, does nothing.

Did you attend Open House this weekend? You could've gotten a free deck out of it, and actually play the game for a bit.

I didn’t know it was going on...I missed out.

[Gauntlet]

Open House is at pretty much every store that runs MTG.

[Zhentarim]

Open House is at pretty much every store that runs MTG.

I know where one of those is...it looks like it might go out of business soon...but its the only one in my area.

[LansXero]

There is always Magic Arena