Magic: The Gathering

Noimporta

The correct choice is to drop whatever deck you're building and instead do an UR Krark's Thumb deck.

Bastion

Then you can just flip out, to coin a phrase.

Nyktos

I always wanted to be a legendary land.

Bastion

And a legendary land that's the new Cabal Coffers no less.

Zennistrad

Wow, it's almost creepy how that happened.

Gaijin0

oh wow this land is insane i hope this kind of mana acceleration is a major thing in theros i always need more ramp. lol

Zennistrad

 

I... I have no words for this.

Bastion

I got ninety-nine creatures and a goyf ain't one...

glennmagusharvey

A bunch more here: http://www.magatheblathering.com/

Vorpy

Zennistrad wrote: »

 

I... I have no words for this.

Is it viable?

Blueeyedrat

And now, a sample from the best Twitter account:

Stormtroper

I wonder if I'm the only one here who still occasionally plays a single-player engine of Magic: the Gathering.

Anyhows, I've been digging this channel:

Stormtroper

Continuing from here:
I went 5/0 today. I got a quest to cast white and black spells and another to cast white and blue spells, so I made two new decks: a WB lifegain one and the UW aggro-control one with flyers that's kind of popular, both seemed solid at this power level, although I realized too late that for the lifegain deck I didn't add the lands that gain you a life when they enter the battlefield.
The experience quests are not dailies as I thought, they're weeklies, so the game isn't really expecting you to do all that each day. There's still the 50 gold per victory, I kinda want to play some more but ehh, I think I should get into the habit of not getting too absorbed into it. Plus I get to say I was unbeaten today.

Stormtroper

I went 5/4 yesterday, I think my new-player honeymoon is ending, I gotta start thinking about working on my deck. I don't want to netdeck (copying a tried-and-true deck from the 'net) but I don't want to spend resources on cards I won't be using in the long term either. Dilemmas. I suppose I can play it safe and get mana-fixing lands, those never stop being relevant.
As for today, 4/2. My first two games were one blackout power fluctuation and one disconnect (while I was ahead, at that) and I'm convinced not to play more than necessary for completing quests, nonetheless the other four were victories so that's encouraging. I played with the WU flyers deck, I didn't think much of it when I made it but it feels solid, it's probably better than my regular RG deck, I should consider working on it instead. Speaking of working on it, I got the Dimir deck but none of the cards fit there.
Tomorrow I should receive the remaining nub reward starter decks, with those I should be able to noticeably improve my stuff.
Edit: Not blackout.

Stormtroper

I went 4/4 today. I got super lucky one game against a UG combo deck with lots of cycling. The turn after they filled the board with stuff I drew/scryed as much as I could and the last card I could possibly get was the shock I needed to win.
For the purpose of doing quests I made a UB deck with flyers, similar to the UW one. I lost the first game in large part because I forgot to add swamps. The black was kinda forced there just to have the means of destroying creatures for the purpose of the quest.
I got several new decks, but apparently that was something to do with format rotations, not the daily nub quest. I got a bunch of stuff from Ikoria and new Theros rather than the newest Ravnica, and for the quest I got a mythic wildcard which is also nice. I should get those new decks tomorrow.
I have 6650 gold which I assume is a lot, I should consider spending it. I was considering stockpiling it and eventually spend it on limited but I'm not sure that's a good idea, certainly not until learning how to play limited properly.
Looking at the limited options there's sealed, traditional draft, major draft and quick draft. Sealed is gems only, draft is gems or gold but (unlike elsewhere) the price in gold is more than five times the price in gems. Unlike in hearthstone, one gets to keep the drafted cards, although of course the entry price is much steeper. Major draft is greater risk/greater reward than quick, although if one counts the drafted cards as any other I think quick draft is more rewarding, I guess it depends on the person and their goals. Traditional draft is even more risk/reward, but the difference in doing badly (one or no victories) is so small and the difference is doing okay is so large (three victories gets you a better prize than six in premier) (the draft ends after losing thrice) that I wonder if I'm missing something.
Regardless, it seems drafting is the source of gems for us free-to-players.

fourteenwings

This sounds a lot like gambling.

The turn after they filled the board with stuff I drew/scryed as much as I could and the last card I could possibly get was the shock I needed to win.

A real life Shadowverse moment right there.

Stormtroper

Nah, when you gamble there's the possibility of getting something out of it.
I started a Throne of Eldraine quest (the Grimm's tales set) on Forge, I made a GB purportedly food deck, however I find it frustrating to play, I think it's the lack of focus plus the tendency of matches to stall and then I win after ages of attacking with a Beanstalker Giant that then gets chump-blocked.

Stormtroper

So today I went 9/3, one of those games was against somebody who on their first turn cast a shock to my face and then conceded. For the decks reward quest I had to cast 100 spells, which took way more than these quests tend to take.
So I got the deck rewards. Awww, I didn't get the Ravnica decks that I wanted, I got the Ikoria ones, apparently I got into the game just in time to miss the bulk of these rewards. At least, I think I got Ikoria decks, I didn't pay attention to their names, though they definitely include stuff from other sets.
Well, even if I didn't get shock lands, I got scry lands so that's still good.
Also I got an Embercleave, a card I heard is crazy good.
I wonder if the game cheats against mana screwing in your starting hand, I don't remember having gotten a starting hand with less than two lands or more than four.

Stormtroper

(Two days ago) I went 5/1. On my first match of the day I got disconnected, as usual I could not reconnect soon enough but when I got back turns out I had won, or at least it was counted as a victory for the purpose of today's quest.
Another disconnect on the second game and I'm convinced not to play more outside the evening when my connection is more reliable. I only lost a turn but I feel I would've won if I had had that turn.
Another one of those matches was against someone who conceded immediately. Bad hand?
(Yesterday) I went 4/3. For a deck based on creatures my deck is really lacking in them, that's what I thought when I first made it and it's showing now. Still, I'm not sure if I should spend my wildcards on that.
(Today) I went 5/3. In one of those games I disconnected the turn right before I was going to win, though fortunately I did manage to reconnect on time.
The reward for the daily quest was 750 gold, 250 more than usual (and 50% longer), I wonder why.

fourteenwings

@Stormtroper: Based on this manga I'm reading... what's a 'Burn'? Like, a Burn Type deck utilizes Burns and these are a thing that is like... what exactly?

I'm hoping this is a real MtG thing they lifted rather than a thing that they just invented.

Stormtroper

Yah, they didn't invent it. A burn spell is a spell (usually red and involves fire or electricity) that deals damage directly to a target, a burn deck is one that relies on these spells to deal damage to the opponent or kill their stuff.
e.g. the card Shock I've mentioned before:

fourteenwings

Ah, I see, pretty simple.

>when accountant Superman gets hit by lightning

fourteenwings

By the way this is the manga I was reading.

Funnily enough it had a character with Hawaiian mythology themed cards in the Burn deck that prompted me to ask this and we were just talking about that one Hawaiian thing the other day;

Stormtroper

I can't say I remember what's the Hawaiian thing from the other day.
Also, it took me longer than it should have to realize that "Pele" didn't refer to the football player.

fourteenwings

Me too!

I can't say I remember what's the Hawaiian thing from the other day.

Turns out it was a Maori thing and I misremembered.

Taumatawhakatangi­hangakoauauotamatea­turipukakapikimaunga­horonukupokaiwhen­uakitanatahu.

Stormtroper

Ah, I completely forgot about that. That'd have been quite a coincidence.
I went 6/1 today, save for one time I got stuck with the two lands I started with I gotta say I got good draws.
Today's special offer was 500 gold for 50 gold (or 10 gems).
Regardless, I'm starting to wonder what's the point in gathering all those resources if I'm not going to spend them. That said, I've been having good win/lose ratios so it's not like I'm being pressed to build better stuff. For a while I've been waiting until the matchmaking system (that I assume exists) paired me with harder opponents who warrant improving my deck but it's taking a while.
Perhaps I should try the other play modes (or ladder, even) and see what happens.

Stormtroper

I've been having good win/lose ratios

Damn, I jinxed it, I went 4/6 this time.
For some reason after a game the client asked me if I had enjoyed that game, I wonder what that was about. I didn't draw mountains and only got to play one then-useless Season of Growth so I responded I didn't. The fact that I played against a land-destruction deck (which tend to be annoying to play against) may have had to do with it.
In another game I started having connection issues (unusual at that time of the day, I think it was the router) in a game I was losing but was about to have a great turn (two Seasons of Growth and one Gnarlback Rhino in play, with two Wild Growths and a Ram Through in hand plus some other stuff). It's not a given that I'd have won but it was a potential comeback.
Also, one of my opponents mulliganed to 0 cards.

fourteenwings

For some reason after a game the client asked me if I had enjoyed that game, I wonder what that was about.

I think that might just be a random customer service thing, which as always tend to pick the worst time for such surveys.

Stormtroper

So I looked it up:

More Information on Smooth Shuffling: We are currently testing changes to the shuffler algorithm to decrease the number of games with extreme examples of "mana flood" or "mana screw" (drawing too many or too few lands).

We are using this opportunity to gather more data and to fine tune these changes, as well as allow for player feedback.

(Emphasis mine) So that explains the question and the absence of useless hands. That's weird, hmmm... on one hand it makes decks "inaccurate" to the real thing, on the other hand nobody likes losing without even getting to play the game. I gotta say Smooth Shuffling does justice to its name, though I hope there's a convenient way to playtest decks that's faithful to how it works in competitive play. Also with that in mind I can now be more daring when pondering whether to mulligan, knowing that there's an unusually good chance the next hand will be good.
Anyhows, I went 4/6 again today, I lost like four times before my first victory. Also I may have miscounted and lost 7 instead.
In one of those games I had a graphics lag spike just as I was activating my Evolving Wilds, causing me to search for a Forest instead of the Mountain I needed for a turn-two Zhur-Taa Goblin that fit perfectly in the very aggressive hand I got, thus making me miss 6 damage worth of combat. I'd have been miffed if I had lost over that, fortunately the hand was good enough and my opponent didn't have stuff to deal with it so in the end it didn't make a difference. IIRC I also lucked out in that I drew a mountain that I needed to not get screwed out of red mana.

fourteenwings

on one hand it makes decks "inaccurate" to the real thing, on the other hand nobody likes losing without even getting to play the game.

I thought a big part of building a physical deck is to try and minimize bad hands via overall formulation?

I understand that it makes it work better as a "real" online game, but it dampens the strategy (and more importantly, Romance) aspects of the game.