M14 Spoiler: Shadowborn Demon

Come on! I'm looking for a UB Demon Legend, here. :) Ah, but I takes what I can gets.

Check out the details on M14 plus Duels of the Planeswalkers 2014 over at Star City Games.

Included is this guy:

Shadowborn Demon - 3BB

Creature - Demon

Flying

When Shadowborn Demon enters the battlefield, destroy target non-Demon creature.

At the beginning of your upkeep, if there are fewer than six creature cards in your graveyard, sacrifice a creature.

5/6

In addition to looking super-friendly with a face made out of fire, he's a 5 power flyer for 5 mana. Plus, he kills something on his way in. You know, 'cause he's born out of shadows. And his face is on fire. Or, his whole head is made out of fire. Something with fire.

But he's not all just fun and games. The best demons aren't. And by "best," I mean, "most flavorful." You have to keep some creatures in the graveyard to keep from feeding this demon snacks every turn. At least he doesn't also eat creatures from your graveyard. Note, his first ability is not a "you may" ability. It's not optional. If you summon this guy, you have to destroy another creature. If it happens to be one of your creatures, well, that's alright with fire-face too.

Dimir State of Mind: Redux

It's a Lazav / Dimir extravaganza! Check out my full "Dimir State and Mind" deck list on tappedout.net, here.



If you're going to build a Dimir deck for Commander, one way to go is just to search for the Dimir watermark in Gatherer. Throw those cards together, add some lands, and boom. Dimir. But that's not the only way to build a Dimir deck and I wanted to include some other cards that tickle my fancy.

So, what is "Dimir" really all about?

It is a guild of secrecy, manipulation and underhanded deals, a shadowy organization operating behind the scenes to twist Ravnica to its own ends. The guild provides espionage, smuggling, burglary, counter-intelligence, assassination and other illegal services for the Ravnican populace.... The guild is so secretive that even its own agents often do not know who they truly work for. -MTGSalvation Wiki

In other words, sneaky, sneaky.

Being sneaky is one thing. Living through it and possibly even winning is another. So, it all comes down to a balance between "flavor" and "power." For my Dimir deck, I decided that I wanted a good chance of milling someone out. Running someone out of 100 cards is fun! But, I wanted the mill to be a misdirection. You think you know what I'm up to, but really something else is what gets you. Poison. Infect seems like a Dimir thing to do.

I also don't want to be a D.O.U.C.H.B.A.G. or break any of my own deckbuilding rules with things players hate. So, while you might be thinking, "why didn't he use card X," it's probably because card X makes the game silly. Same goes for too much of a good thing. I tried to pick a few cards that represent the guild flavor without going overboard (control magic, milling, poison, etc).

On to the deck!

There are a few blue / black legends that could be used in the Commander slot, but Lazav, Dimir Mastermind is the direction I went. It also meant that milling had more than one purpose. Lazav for president! (Secret president.)

Instead of breaking the rest of the cards down by type, I'm going to break them down by theme. The main themes are:

1) Milling
2) Abusing Other Players' Graveyards (and Creatures, and Libraries)
3) Library Manipulation
4) Poison5) Defense
6) Ramp and Other Stuff

Milling

A big chunk of the deck is dedicated to milling because it makes Lazav wild and whacky, plus it supports theme #2 (Abusing Other Players' Graveyards). Milling refers to running a player's library out of cards. When a player would draw a card from an empty library, they lose. Doesn't matter about life totals or anything else, they just lose.

There are a lot of cards that mill libraries in this game, but since this is a multi-player format, I looked for cards that either hit one player really hard or hit everyone. Special attention was paid to cards that hit over and over since reusable effects tend to be more powerful with longer games.

Geth, Dreamborn Muse, Consuming Aberration, Nemesis of Reason, and Mindshrieker are supported by Whispering Madness, and Sword of Body and Mind. Mindcrank, Mesmeric Orb, and Keening Stone, and Jace, Memory Adept round out the "reusable" milling team. The best part is that most of these don't require a continued commitment to mana. Once they are out there, they just do their thing while you are free to further your other plans.



On the "one shot" milling team, Mind Grind, Traumatize, Telemin Performance, and Memory Jar all drop the bomb. Traumatize or a juiced-up Mind Grind can be devastating.

Finally, there are a few cards that go with this theme. They do create a couple of infinite combos. It's more of a side-effect than a theme or goal, though. Bloodchief Ascension and Duskmantle Guildmage give the milling some oomph. For those of you who are interested, the infinite combos involve Mindcrank. Mill a card, take some damage, take some damage, mill a card, etc.

Abusing Other Players' Graveyards (and Creatures, and Libraries)

This is where the real fun comes in. The deck itself doesn't do much on its own. Instead, it takes your stuff from you and uses it against you. This is my way of showing how House Dimir operates from the shadows.



A card like Blatant Thievery is awesome, but there's nothing blatant about how Dimir operates. So, the cards that made the cut are a little less obvious. For taking creatures and messing with libraries, we have Telemin Performance (dance for me!), Bribery, Treachery (don't they sound good together?), Corrupted Conscience, Lord of the Void, and Memnarch. For abusing graveyards, we have Beacon of Unrest, Wrexial, Sepulchral Primordial, Geth, Dimir Doppleganger, Consuming Aberration, and Liliana Vess.

Library Manipulation

Getting what you want, when you want it seems like a very Dimir way to go. Plans within plans. But, too many tutors can ruin the game for everyone. If it becomes "too easy" to pull off whatever your deck is trying to do, you've gone too far down the road with this one. I probably have too many tutors still, but we'll see. Otherwise, I looked for cards that do a little something for me over and over.

For raw tutoring, the deck includes Demonic Tutor, Diabolic Tutor, Fabricate, and Rune-Scarred Demon. Oh, and Liliana Vess for her second ability. I considered Expedition Map and a few others, but ultimately left them out to make room for other cards.

For more comments about how this works (and why), check out my "Tutor, Draw, and Manipulate" post. But for this deck, I went with Sensei's Divining Top, Darksteel Pendant, and Soldevi Excavations. All three of these cards give me some control over what I will be drawing. They are cheap to cast and activate, and reusable. Just the way I like it. Oh, and they make Future Sight - one of my favorite cards - work even better.



Speaking of my favorite cards, this deck includes Future Sight and it's wizard cousin, Magus of the Future.  More than Rhystic Study, more than Fact or Fiction, more than even Phyrexian Arena, more than just about anything else that lets me draw cards, I want Future Sight. It's incredibly strong and only gets better with ways to reorder the top of your library or shuffle (like with fetch lands). I'm also a big fan of Temporal Aperture. Not because it's good, but because I just like it. So, it's in here, too. When you've got 5 mana sitting around, cross your fingers and tap out!

Other than that, the deck includes Bloodgift Demon, Consecrated Sphinx, and Sphinx of Uthuun. I had Phyrexian Arena and Fact or Fiction in the deck, but I'd rather have the creature-versions of these cards. Oh, and Consecrated Sphinx is off the chain, of course.

Poison

Poison is one of those "too good" things. It's capable of knocking out players with no fanfare, sometimes very early in the game. I get that. To keep things from getting too "poisoney," none of my creatures have "infect" or "poisonous" built in. That makes it more difficult to make this work. Also, I don't have that many cards that let me give out the "infect" ability. It's more of an alternate way to win when someone is packing a lot of life gain than anything else and it felt like it was in flavor.

To dish out infect, the deck includes Glistening Oil, Phyresis, Grafted Exoskeleton, Corrupted Conscience, and Tainted Strike. All of these can be used to make a creature really scary, to mess with combat math, or to wipe someone out with extreme prejudice. Don't touch that body. It's infected.

Defense

Since the deck is not packing any sweepers or even spot removal - Really?! - I have to put up some kind of defenses, right? Along with creatures to block with, this deck includes No Mercy, Forcefield, Maze of Ith, Drana, and to a lesser extent, Sheoldred. I also consider Liliana Vess and Jace, Memory Adept as "defense" cards since players often have to commit some damage to them or they will go ultimate. It's really not much defense and depends heavily on making myself a less attractive target to opposing players.



Ramp and Other Stuff

There is a fair amount of non-green ramp and land-searching in this deck. It's one of the things I like about the game, so I lean in that direction. I really hate missing land drops. This deck includes, Sol Ring, Thran Dynamo, and Gilded Lotus. It also includes, Wayfarer's Bauble, Armillary Sphere, Thawing Glaciers, and Solemn Simulacrum.

As for the "other stuff," it has the four Island fetchlands + Rings of Brighthearth, and Dark Depths for those really long games. Painful Quandary always brings a smile to my face (when I am the one playing it). Exquisite Blood to mess with the combat math between other players. Kozilek, mostly to protect me from milling, but also to cast when things go sideways. Lightning Greaves, Whispersilk Cloak, and Darksteel Plate to make my creatures better, faster, and less blockable.



That, my friends, rounds out what I hope to be a Dimir deck capable of winning in a couple of less-than-obvious ways without devolving into a boring, repetitious, douchbag, blue/black, themeless control deck. Let me know what you think!

Dimir: Playing UB Again

I'm back to UB, but it's for a worthy cause. Lazav isn't going to play himself. I still look over at my shiny demons from time-to-time, but I know that they are waiting for me. If anything, demons are patient.



I haven't updated the deck list in a while, but I will. I have a few more changes to make after playing a half-dozen games. Whenever I play, I'm always reminded on how precious each slot is in a deck. If the card you have in that slot doesn't affect the game in a big way, it's worth taking a second look at. You know the feeling of tapping out to play and card and passing your turn with no impact. "I'll draw 4 cards... wee!"



Most of my testing has been against Chris with his new "Oozing Elves," Ezuri, Renegade Leader deck. As expected, most games ended with serious elf beatdown of the Overrun variety. Between Door of Destinies, Coat of Arms, and Ezuri, the results were carnage and bloodshed. Plus, Chris managed to jam home a Quietus Spike on several occasions for extra beats.



That said, I did eek out a win or two against the pointy-eared onslaught. One win came off the back of a bribed out Worldspine Wurm. What you bribe a wurm of that size with, I'm not sure. Lazav knows, though. So, I'm sitting back on the Wurm, blocking elves when I draw into Grafted Exoskeleton and Whispersilk Cloak. "I'll just put this here and that there. Oh, and attack you for 15 poison... unblockable... with your own wurm-thing. Gross."



Otherwise, there was a time or two where I activated Duskmantle Guildmage with Traumatize on the stack. Dreads never knew what hit him.



I'm still looking forward to playing a larger game where I can develop my sinister plans, Dimir-style. There's nothing quite like making the "What me? I'm no threat" face while deflecting attacks at other opponents. It's also a fun feeling to have other players worried about being milled out when "the win" comes from a totally different direction.

Bwahaha! How to be the worst...

If you missed this article, go there now and read it. :)

How to be the Worst EDH Player in the World

Here's a delicious excerpt:

KrazyCaley: Especially avoid any kind of unifying theme. Don't make your deck about octopi and kraken, or time counters, or Thieves' Auction, or anything that will make people think you are creative or out to have fun. The theme of your deck should be winning. Pay no attention at all to questions of flavor, art, unusual card interactions/play states, or wonky, rarely-used generals. In fact, why pay attention at all when you could just grab a ruthlessly optimized decklist of the ol' internet and ruin your friends' desire to play Magic for the rest of the week? It's all a part of what I like to call "dickbuilding," which is really just the best form of deckbuilding.

Dungeons & Dragons with Magic Cards

Getting together to play Magic with friends is one of my favorite past-times. Last weekend, I had a chance to briefly test out some alternate rules I've been working on to play Magic with a twist. Try playing Magic as a dungeon crawler with these alternate rules.

You can check out the alternate rules for "Encounter Magic" here. The cool part is that it's easy to try since you can use whatever decks you have laying around. And, it would be pretty neat to use your Commander deck on the player side of the encounter. It has a co-op element that turns Magic on its side and it's quick.

Biggest Effect, Least Mana

In other posts, I talked about how cards that were good in constructed formats are often good in Commander. I also talked about how the designers create a relationship between cost and effect when designing cards. So, what can you do with this information?

Whenever I am selecting cards for a deck, I use a website like magiccards.info to search. Something as simple as "draw a card" shows up in every color and in lots of different ways. Certain cards rise to the top depending on what I am trying to accomplish with the deck, the theme, and how I think it will play when it is all put together.

For example, if I wanted to put a deck together for a constructed tournament (like Legacy), I look for cards that give me the biggest effect for the least amount of mana. The priority is to get the effect for the least amount of mana. In Commander, the priority is the other way around. I still want the card with the biggest effect for the least amount of mana, but in Commander, I the biggest effect is the priority.

Here's a simple example of how this works. Let's say that I am building a quick, Black / Red deck for Legacy and I want to include some burn. For one red mana, Lightning Bolt is an instant-speed, 3 damage spell. Boom. At one Phyrexian red mana, Gut Shot does its thing, but it only does 1 damage. A while back, they slowed down the direct damage by printing Shock for one red mana and 2 damage. Shock is inferior to Lightning Bolt. They go back and forth on Lightning Bolt and Shock depending on the set, but one of those two spells is usually the benchmark for the mana-to-damage ratio curve.



Now, let's say that I am building a Black / Red Commander deck. Do I want Lightning Bolt, Shock, or Gut Shot? I probably don't want any of these spells because even though they are efficient, they don't do much in the grand scheme of things. In a game that can last more than 10 turns with a whole table full of players, 3 damage isn't going to cut it. Besides, there's a really good chance that I'll have the mana to support spells that cost way more than one red. So, what I really want is a spell that hits everyone or everything at the table for lots of damage at the lowest mana cost, but the priority in this format is the damage not the mana.

So, a spell like Disaster Radius for 5RR (7cc mana) costs a lot more than Lightning Bolt, but the effect can really swing the game. Sure, you can't drop Disaster Radius out of nowhere to burn a little creature that is giving you trouble, but you can drop it out of nowhere to really flip the game in your favor. How about each of your opponents creatures take X damage?



Another way to look at this is in one-vs-one constructed formats, turns 1-4 really matter. Games are often decided in those turns. Decks that hold out and take a long view of the game can work too, but you're still only running up against one opponent. In Commander, you're looking down a lot of barrels and turns 1-4 are almost always just setup turns. You might play a ramp spell or two. You might play a small utility creature or something that gives you a small incremental advantage. You probably aren't coming out guns blazing and dropping bombs all across the table.

By turn 5 though, things get interesting. Many players will have access to their Commander and a good amount of mana thanks to all the land dropping and ramping from the first 4 turns. But, you still probably aren't going to cast a flurry of spells that turn. This is where looking at your spells as bigger effects starts to matter. All the way up to turn 10, you are going to have enough mana to play one or two spells per turn. So, if I have 7 mana available, I want a big spell, the biggest spell I can get and still cast it. Bolting someone for 3 and passing my turn is not what I want to do here. Pointing a Flame Wave at someone looks pretty good though.

Things Players Hate

I touched on this in a few previous posts, but now seems as good a time as any to list my personal rules for deckbuilding since I am adding a new "no-no" to the list.

Okay, here's the thing: You can build your Commander deck any way you want to. It's a great idea to follow the banned list if you are going to be playing against strangers since it puts everyone on the same page. At the same time, lots of us play with the same group week after week, so if your group has a separate banned list, go with that.

Now, with that out of the way, there are a few main themes and game mechanics that suck to play against. This isn't a universal truth, but it's probably close to one. If you are the kind of player that takes special joy in playing with the things on this list, that's cool. Just know that the rest of the table is probably going to start looking for excuses to not invite you to the next gaming session. :)

Off the top of my head, here's the list of major items that I won't include in a deck. I might put one or two cards in that do something on this list, especially if they serve a good purpose; but, I won't make it a "main theme."

No-no List

• Hand Destruction
• Land Destruction
• Eldrazi (Annihilator, See Land Destruction)
• Combo
• Bounce
• Creature Steal (This one is new.)

Watch List

• Taking Extra Turns
• Life Gain
• Counter Magic
• Poison / Infect

Hand Destruction / Land Destruction / Eldrazi

As it turns out, people like to play the spells they put in their decks. Who knew? Things that directly interfere with being able to play the game at a basic level are totally part of the game - a part of the game that sucks to play against.

My heart is sad that the Eldrazi fall into this category. They are damn cool. But, I hate the look on my opponents faces when I attack into them with one (or more!) of the monsters.



Combo

There's a big difference between synergy and outright combo. No one cares that you play Sylvan Library and Abundance in your green deck and draw three cards per turn with no loss of life. That's just cool. What people care about is your crazy, fifth turn, storm combo deck that kills everyone. It's neat once, maybe.

Bounce

Same deal here. One or two bounce spells are fine. Bouncing everything, over and over, falls into the "not getting to play" camp. A camp that sucks.

Creature Steal

This one is new to my list. As usual, there's a story that goes along with this.

Chris (Kaervek), Will (Kemba), and I (Bolas) were playing a quick three-player game of Commander. Will played Kemba on turn two or three, equipped her up with a couple things including Darksteel Plate, and started pumping out filthy, filthy cats. I took Kemba with Treachery on turn five. I believe that if I hadn't done that, Chris and I would have gotten slaughtered with steriod-rage-kitty beat down. Will had Crusade out too, for good measure. But, that's not the point.

The point is that between Treachery, Slave of Bolas, Control Magic, and other similar spells, I was able to steal creatures left and right. When I took Kaervek, I saw the light dim in Chris' eyes. It's just not fun to play against that much creature steal. And I'm not having fun when it's at the expense of others.

The problem is that if I cast Murder, I'm down one card and my opponent is down one creature. But, if I cast Control Magic on that same creature, it's a double-plus swing. My opponent is down one creature still, but now I'm even because I gained a creature. Oh, and now I'm going to beat your face in with it. Thanks.



Taking Extra Turns

As for the Watch List, taking an extra turn once in a while is annoying. It's not that it's a powerful effect (which is really is), it's that it means they don't get to play. People are already waiting for 3-8 other people to finish their turns before they get a crack at casting the cools spells they brought to the table. When you take an extra turn, it means that they have to wait even longer.

Life Gain

You want to pick up a handful of life points here and there? Great. But, don't be that guy that spikes to hundreds or thousands of life. Yes, you can still lose to Commander damage, but too much life gain completely nullifies a lot of decks out there that can't chew through that much life before the universe suffers heat death.

Counter Magic

Counterspell (and it's ilk) is not quite as powerful in a multiplayer game, given that there are usually too many targets to stop everything from getting through. So, Counter Magic is only on my watch list. If I find myself cramming too much Counter Magic into a deck, I take a step back.

This also applies to "tucking" the Commander with Hinder. It's a valid strategy, but against the right deck and Commander, it means the player you target is basically out of the game. Is that their fault for relying so much on their Commander? Maybe. But, what if they love that particular Legend? What then?



Poison / Infect

Until or unless they make it more than 10 poison counters to take a guy out, this one stays on the watch list. There are a handful of ways to sail in under the radar with some sort of evasion and take a guy out in one or two swings. Unless your opponents are set up to handle this particular line of attack, it's like the ultimate way of saying "you don't get to play."

Playing against more than one opponent makes the "no-no" list flexible. I mean, if you start to show strength at the table, these things have a way of self-correcting when everyone targets you with their bombs and their guns. But, just because everyone wants to put pressure on you doesn't mean they can. Destroying lands and stealing Commanders can push a player towards irrelevance in short order.