Goldfishing With E

It's been so long since I gave Estrid a shot that some goldfishing seemed like a good idea.

I know I've sounded a little dour about the Commander 2019 decks, but holy crow has that opinion been reinforced at nearly every turn. Opening hand after hand I would have Auras for creatures, and zero creatures.

Because only a quarter of the deck is creatures.

Why the heck IS that? WotC has to know, right? The ratios for getting a deck to do what you want it to do? They are usually spectacular at getting the mana correct.  The percentage of mana to everything else; typically 37%, so players can reliably cast their cards.

So why is this deck so bad?

Seriously! Since we know that Auras need permanents to enchant, why are players not given enough of those permanents?

Also, why, exactly, is Sol Ring in this deck? It is the only artifact and nowhere on it does it use the word 'enchantment'. There are zero interactions between Sol Ring and enchantments. There aren't even interactions between Sol Ring and Tuvasa or Kestia, the other two possible commanders for this deck.

If that isn't a signal that Commander set design is stale, I don't know what is.

Finally, the mana ratios are way off here. Plugging this deck into Deckstats.net, the green is over represented and while one can argue that this is helpful for mana fixing, since the land Auras need green to work, they only need one green mana. That's the whole point, right? That green can fix your mana easily, without over-representing the color?

I wouldn't even be asking these questions, if the rest of the deck seemed balanced. Things are just so skewed, I don't know why I should trust anything in this deck.

So if the goldfishing is troublesome, are the actual games even worse?

Siege 1 Pt 2

In the time that Jason and I had left, we got to play some games of constructed, with small tweaks to our decks using Siege 1 cards.

There weren't many character tweaks; character tweaks to a deck generally mean revolutionizing an entire deck, in my experience.

But we did get to play with some new cards: Jason was particularly enamored with Erratic Energy Grenade. I am a fan of it as well but I didn't see it as being as helpful in his Constructicon deck, yet he felt it worked. I'm thinking that it should be in a deck playing against a combiner team-more damage dealt overall.

More testing, as always, will bear one of us out.

And more testing is something I wish we'd been able to do. There were cards I tried in two different decks that didn't appear in the game, (specifically EM24 IR Laser Launcher) so establishing how good or useful they are is still in question.

Plus, neither one of us opened an RR Energy Blade. How does that happen?

The most difficult match that evening for me, hands down, was against Volcanicus.

I've been a defender of I Still Function for a long time: I think the card makes for some epic stories and those moments are what makes a game addictive and great.

But against Volcanicus paired with Sludge, Mighty Stomper...this matchup just became miserable. I was playing a blue/pipless deck and still managed to deal out well over seventy damage. We think I might've come close to 100 points of damage. For a deck that isn't focused on aggro, that's remarkable.

And it didn't matter, because Sludge took it away, three times, and it was I Still Function that let him abuse that card.

It was hard to tell Jason that the match was miserable for me, the least fun Transformers game I have ever played. Especially since he was testing running Mighty Stomper maindeck, thinking that the reason people weren't playing Volcanicus was because they were getting it wrong. It certainly seemed like he was right.

But I think people aren't playing Volcanicus because it's miserable instead of epic or amazing when you lose, and once you know the weak point, easy to dismantle. The next game I played a 4-wide Insecticon deck (aggressive and heavier orange) and I was able to remove Grimlock, Powerful Commander early: after that, he couldn't get his deck going and winning felt like a matter of course.

So against the top aggressive decks in the format, it suffers, and against any other deck, you suffer. I was torn between: hey, maybe this is a thing and with refinement, your Volcanicus deck could really be amazing! and oh but this is miserable...

However, in the end I'd rather chalk it up to two things: 1) It could be a bad matchup. Bad matchups happen, and that's why sideboards are great. 2) It could mean that I need to improve my own deck. New sets are a great time to improve on concepts that aren't fleshed out and my pipless Skywarp deck definitely needs some work!

Finally, it puts the emphasis for me to get better, not on him and his concept.

It's also worth mentioning that Coolstuffinc.com has a weekly Transformers article!

Siege 1 And Sealed

My buddy Jason came down last weekend and we went through two boxes, playing nothing but sealed over two days.

Our conclusion: Turbo Sealed is an anemic format for experienced players. It works but it doesn't show off how great the game is. For new players, however, the format is helpful because the complexity is low enough that new people won't be overwhelmed. If you're an experienced player though, it feels as though you don't have enough choices to make the games engaging.

Here's how we think you should play Sealed in Siege 1: Each player gets 3 packs and builds the best 25 star character team they can. Ignore the star value of your battle cards. You're playing with all of them.

You can effectively ignore the star value on your cards for two reasons: first, some of them, such as Ultra Magnus' armor, are difficult to play to begin with, due to restrictions of who it can be on, and the number in your deck, almost certainly just one. Which leads to the second reason:

Second; sealed inherently has issues with power levels and people occasionally get busted packs. We accept this as just part of the game: if Jason opens a General Optimus Prime and I open two Sargent Skrapnel, (which I did) you can probably guess how the game is going to go.

But that isn't certain: it's just really good for him. If we buy into that, then why bicker over the star count in sealed, which has players doing the best they can with random elements?

So don't: the games will feel more robust and sure, there will still be dead cards, but the improvement in gameplay will make up for it.

Rules Layering

This post made its way to my attention and it does a damn fine job going through the layer portion of Magic's rules.

That's never a bad thing to refresh.

This weekend I'm going to get to play a whole bunch of Siege 1, so I look forward to talking about the new Transformers set next week!

Commander -Estrid, the Masked

New Commander time!

Estrid, the Masked

Instant Creeping Renaissance Kruphix's Insight Dismantling Blow Bant Charm	Artifacts Sol Ring
Enchantment Estrid's Invocation Ever-Watching Threshold Octopus Umbra Myth Unbound Sigil of the Empty Throne Dictate of Kruphix Bear Umbra Enchantress's Presence Epic Proportions Ground Seal Spawning Grounds Finest Hour Righteous Authority Sage's Reverie Soul Snare Unquestioned Authority Eel Umbra Vow of Flight Dawn's Reflection Fertile Ground Overgrowth Snake Umbra Vow of Wildness Wild Growth Unflinching Courage	Sorcery Empyrial Storm Genesis Storm Martial Coup Phyrexian Rebirth Winds of Rath
Lands 9 Plains 6 Island 8 Forest Forge of Heroes Azorius Chancery Blossoming Sands Command Tower Evolving Wilds Krosan Verge Meandering River Mosswort Bridge Seaside Citadel Selesnya Sanctuary Simic Growth Chamber Terramorphic Expanse Thornwood Falls Tranquil Cove Tranquil Expanse Woodland Stream	Creatures Bruna, Light of Alabaster Eidolon of Blossoms Kestia, the Cultivator Tuvasa the Sunlit Heavenly Blademaster Nylea's Colossus Ravenous Slime Arixmethes, Slumbering Isle Hydra Omnivore Ajani's Chosen Celestial Archon Silent Sentinel Boon Satyr Herald of the Pantheon Cold-Eyed Selkie Daxos of Meletis Elderwood Scion Loyal Unicorn Loyal Drake Loyal Guardian Archetype of Imagination Whitewater Naiads Aura Gnarlid Reclamation Sage Yavimaya Enchantress

What is this deck? Well, aside from being the enchantment themed deck of last year's Commander product, I'm not entirely sure.

This is the third (and final) deck from last year that I'll be playing and tweaking and I have to say; the feeling that 2019's Commander product was lacking has been justified in my playthroughs. The decks don't have cards they probably should, don't have interesting reprints, the power level is diffused to the detriment of focus, and they don't feel very fun to play. In previous years, I would break a deck from the box and often would hang with modestly tuned Commander decks.

With these decks I always feel outclassed.  But that's OK: the first few playthroughs might be rough, but they'll definitely teach me plenty about where this deck needs to go-and maybe, if Tuvasa the Sunlit or Kestia the Cultivator should take Estrid's place. Admittedly, neither of those cards seem very interesting but that doesn't mean it's incorrect to change.  

That's Fine, But Take The Next Step

There was a rules announcement for the Transformers game on Monday. The gist of it is: You can only take ONE turn in a row using Peace Through Tyranny. Then you have to let your opponent go, even if you can chain together multiple turns.

Which...is fine, I guess? I'm more into cards doing what they say they would do, with the less outside clarification needed, the better. But this issue needed to be addressed and I'm glad they did. Errata for a card is an adequate solution but without the ability to easily call up said errata, I think they're setting things up for trouble later on-and not that much later, either.

Because I'm less worried about this specific ruling for Peace Through Tyranny (the ruling is OK but not what I would've done) and much more concerned about what this means for the health of the game at large. Rules disputes happen all the time. The ability to quickly resolve them without a judge is critical to getting players back to doing what they should be doing: playing the game.

Someone suggested that they will just update the PDF but that isn't enough, in my opinion. The pdf is 47 pages long right now, and while it's a searchable document, it's still unwieldly and currently doesn't reflect today's updated ruling. That page count will only get longer once Siege 1 is added and more questions need to be answered, plus it certainly isn't what I would call easily usable with today's technological capacities.

So c'mon Wizards. Let's get that database going!

One Last Sweep

Alright, here we are. I think I'm done; Yennet feels like it's in that 'tuned but not focused' zone. It can do some cool stuff but it doesn't want to do broken things and I like that.

I cut Barren Moor, Secluded Steppe, and Lonely Sandbar for Island, Swamp, and Evolving Wilds. The shuffle effect from Wilds matters to this deck and SO MANY lands enter the battlefield tapped that I wanted to make gameplay a little faster for me. Those were the last changes I made to the deck.

The way I've built Yennet, it has a pretty severe disadvantage in 1v1 situations; the game pictured looks pretty good for me, but I made a critical mistake by being too aggressive and then Noah was able to blow me out with lots of zombie tokens.

Still, I like what this does and how it functions, and now I'm looking forward to getting on the next one!

Commander-Yennet, Cryptic Sovereign

1 Azorius Signet
1 Commander's Sphere
1 Crystal Ball
1 Dimir Signet
1 Mind Stone
1 Orzhov Signet
1 Seer's Lantern
1 Sol Ring
1 Swiftfoot Boots

1 Enigma Sphinx
1 Magus of the Balance
1 Night Incarnate
1 Sower of Discord
1 Yuriko, the Tiger's Shadow
1 Adarkar Valkyrie
1 Conundrum Sphinx
1 Djinn of Wishes
1 Sphinx of Jwar Isle
1 Sphinx of Uthuun
1 Phyrexian Delver
1 Duskmantle Seer
1 Silent-Blade Oni
1 Loyal Unicorn
1 Geode Golem
1 Mulldrifter
1 Ninja of the Deep Hours
1 Pilgrim's Eye
1 Urborg Emissary
1 Stormscape Battlemage
1 Stormscape Familiar
1 Prognostic Sphinx

1 Soothsaying
1 Future Sight
1 Mind's Dilation

1 Utter End
1 Return to Dust
1 Brainstorm
1 Telling Time
1 Esper Charm
1 Mortify
1 Crib Swap
1 Pollen Lullaby
1 Stir the Pride
1 Dismantling Blow

1 Isolated Watchtower
6 Plains
6 Island
4 Swamp
1 Forge of Heroes
1 Arcane Sanctum
1 Azorius Chancery
1 Azorius Guildgate
1 Command Tower
1 Dimir Aqueduct
1 Dimir Guildgate
1 Dismal Backwater
1 Forsaken Sanctuary
1 Halimar Depths
1 Jwar Isle Refuge
1 Meandering River
1 Mortuary Mire
1 New Benalia
1 Orzhov Basilica
1 Orzhov Guildgate
1 Scoured Barrens
1 Sejiri Refuge
1 Submerged Boneyard
1 Tranquil Cove
1 Evolving Wilds

1 Aminatou, the Fateshifter

1 Terminus
1 Skull Storm
1 Entreat the Angels
1 Army of the Damned
1 Akroma's Vengeance
1 Dream Cache
1 Ponder
1 Portent
1 Treasure Hunt
1 Evangelize
1 Conqueror's Pledge
1 Demonic Collusion
1 Temporal Cascade
1 Mystic Speculation
1 Beacon of Unrest
1 Cleansing Nova

War for Cybertron: Siege 1 Thoughts

Here's a link to a setlist that you can manipulate to see specific factions/battle cards.

The Decepticons

Everyone was waiting for Soundwave and it looks pretty dang cool. How successful the spy patrols are will be what buoys Soundwave to a deck, but at 11 stars, there should be more than enough space to pair him up well.

I really want to like General Megatron but I'm reluctant to go there, since I'm just not sure how many weapons will actually be on the battlefield at any given moment and loading Megatron up seems like putting all your eggs in one basket.

The Runamuck/Runabout synergy looks like a lot of fun and the new Flamecon tribe for the Decepticons that's pure aggro to give the Insects a run for the money is good. Overall the Decepticons seem to get a greater emphasis on upgrades all around. Hopefully this makes for some new decks and strategies.

There's also a collection of 'glory of cool things' and that is harder to appreciate; tap for effect in this game feels really weird, since attacking is your only win condition. Why are we taking away our damage sources for something that isn't reliably forwarding a win condition?

For example: I could either attack with Raider Road Hugger for 3+ whatever orange I get or I can tap it to give +3 attack to something else + whatever orange I get-and I lose a card AND an attack step.

How is that a deal?

Now, as bodies to add to other character teams, shoring up a weakness, adding a tiny bit of damage-or absorbing it- these characters matter. But they seem very narrow and difficult to use to their best potential.

Maybe that will change in upcoming sets.

Autobots:

A playable Ironhide? Well, I never!

It will be really interesting to see how the mechanics of Ratchet and Trailblazer pan out; they are thematic but I don't know that they're good.

I do like the Battle Masters though; how successful they are, again, I'm not sure. The incremental advantage that an attack + a heavy duty weapon can provide is something to get excited about, I think! These could be especially effective as support for a character like Omega Supreme (again).

They also can draw attacks towards other characters; if I have the option to not kill a character that becomes a giant gun for another character, I'd  probably think about it. The strategic decision making goes up, and I believe that's a positive.

Battle Cards:

The Black icon is an interesting addition-again one that plays up incremental advantages, giving any attack at least one point of damage if the black icon flips. I think this will help keep games moving, even against heavy control builds and that's definitely in the spirit of what this game is doing.

But I think the big news is the Secret Actions and what kind of dynamic that will add to the game. Nothing so far looks like a blowout event, but I'm glad the game has enough room for that kind of interaction. The limiting factor in Transformers is the inability to do anything on your opponent's turn; they can see what you've done and nothing is a surprise.

Secret Actions will add more dynamic gameplay and I believe it does so without seriously compromising the way the game feels or is paced. That's some impressive stuff.

I think the EM24 IR Laser Launcher is going to be a bigger deal than expected, and while I don't know if any of the niche cards for trucks (Battering Ram), spaceships (Unconventional Flying Object), or motorcycles (Pop-a-Wheelie) will be enough to make the tribal effects worthwhile, I'm glad to see the support. Maybe I'll be pleasantly surprised!

My one complaint is about the black battle icons. Unfortunately, they blend in too well with the background of the card and are extremely difficult for me to identify-either when I had or flipped them or when my opponent did. I hope they can address this in the future-I asked about it, and they said they'd pass it up the line so here's to hoping!

Core 2020 Thoughts

Overall, this looks like one of the more solid sets I've seen. There doesn't appear to be any clear color weaknesses and blue doesn't look like it will run over everyone. There's interesting things to do, with support for some different strategies.  

All in all, my feelings are positive about this set and I think this is an excellent one for new players to join in. 

White

It is with Gauntlets of Light that I noticed that WotC is allowing for a slightly higher complexity at lowered rarities. There's quite a bit going on for a creature enchantment and though I don't think any of it is difficult to understand, I do think there's plenty to keep track of. This is about where the complexity level ought to be: Gauntlets will reward players for paying attention and skillful use of this one-and others at this rarity. 

This is the first core set with a Disenchant and not a Naturalize that I can remember in a long, long time. This feels unusual, since the effect has been moved to green and I can only assume that there are metagame considerations at play that I'm unaware of.

Leyline of Sanctity is a welcome reprint, but after that I'm not seeing something that really pops except for Brought Back. And BB is probably the glory of cool things but it's still pretty dang cool. 

I also prefer Sephara, Sky's Blade's implementation of indestructible, over Avacyn's. Avacyn exists to make players miserable, Sephara means there's still a game to play. 

In Blue we have a core set without an unconditional counter spell at 3 mana. Again, that's really odd for a core set. 

Atemis, the All Seeing has a neat new win condition for Magic and the nice subtheme on flying creatures feels right. I like it. Tale's End is a weird combination of effects and Octoprophet is a missed opportunity for synergies, buy a reprint of the blue Leyeline is good, and Flood of Tears will almost certainly be a staple at Commander tables everywhere. 

There's also a spirit pirate now, which is always a flavor in.

Black has my favorite dinosaur of the set, Rotting Regisaur. It's big and dumb so what's not to like? I also like how Embodiment of Agonies is teaching us about what different mana costs are in Magic. 

Bloodsoaked Altar will likely go into my garbage cube deck, and if nothing else it's a relief to have at least one card be an easy pick. 

I don't think Dread Presence is going to revitalize mono black control but I would like it too. The effects are powerful but incremental and not promptly game changing. Still I like the design. 

My current feeling is that Red's Cavalier is the strongest in the cycle and the Leyline is an outlet for Red decks against storm, which I welcome, since storm decks are terrible (for the game). Chandra's yearbook snapshot planeswalkers are fun and I hope WotC does similar things with this. I realize the design space might be limited but seeing planeswalkers shift like that is cool. 

I'm glad to see Flame Sweep; Red has been missing proper Pyroclasm effect for far too long, in my opinion. Marauding Raptor is a nice shift on Heartless Summoning, and I wish the Thunderkin Awakener didn't have quite as restrictive a trigger for its attack condition. Still, there's a fun deck to be built around it, I'm sure. 

As we check in with Green there's pretty typical stuff; token makers and giant creatures, some mana ramp speckled in. I think the Leyline of Abundance has the potential to be a lot of fun in any deck that wants to have a turn 1, Forest, mana elf, play. Having four mana on turn two seems like a great way to jumpstart your deck. 

It's Overgrowth Elemental that finally rings my bell about how uncommons are becoming stronger: a 3/2 for three is pretty solid, but the life gain puts it above rate, for me. What makes it really strong is the synergy with elementals; the OE can be useful in nearly any deck but with a little help can really be a beatstick. 

However, it needs a little help; is it good? Yeah. Is it breaking uncommon power level? No; it's just a really solid playable in damn near any deck that wasn't oriented towards elementals.  But with it? Yeah, now that's cool

I also have to admit that I like that they're trying to make Hydras a thing for green. For being the creature color-especially the big creature color-green doesn't have an iconic big creature the same way that the other four do; (Angels, Dragons, Demons, Kraken). Maybe this will be the year where that changes. 

Nightpack Ambusher is the wolf lord that werewolf players have been hoping for and I think it'll be a real boon for that deck. Again; fairly powerful, something that I think players who like that tribe want, but also narrow as a card-while still being perfectly useful in limited formats. Good stuff.

As always, the multicolored stuff is where WotC likes to show off a little and this is no exception. The wedge legends all do some pretty cool stuff and are less bound by M19's dragon history month restrictions. Some are clearly for Commander, like Omnath, others, like Kykar are meant to stimulate the Johnny/Spike economy and power to 'em for it. 

Artifacts, always a tricky business (and for the first time in a Core set, making appearances in color) are kept on the weaker/weirder side with Bag of Holding, Colossus Hammer and Mystic Forge doing their part. But Grafdigger's Cage and Steel Overseer are good to have in the metagame.

I like the role of the lands in M2020 too; color fixing for every style and at common, and I've long since come around on the scry lands from Theros; those things are fantastic and underrated. 

Field of the Dead could do some work in the Commander meta; a way to generate creatures for free is always worth the time and who knows how that might help decks that would go creatureless otherwise.

But Lotus Field is definitely something I want to pick up multiple copies of. A hexproof land mitigates the drawback it has in older formats. No more Wasteland or Ghost Quarter to ruin your day when you've just set your manabase back by two turns. Fair, but cool.

I'm not sure what possibilities will open up as a result of this set-and that's exciting! The fall set hasn't been announced so we don't know where we're headed next but enhancements for artifacts and enchantments exist, suggesting Theros or New Phyrexia, the mana base is so broad right now that a brand new plane could be coming at us, especially since we've spent so much time revisiting old places and concluding big storylines. There's a lot of support for many lines of play or deck concepts which is about as strong as a core set can be.