In light of the fact that poison’s returning in Scars of Mirrodin, I thought it would be a good time to revisit all of the cards that can win you the game. Which ones are the easiest to get off, and which are the best in multiplayer?
Today, I will rank each of alternate win condition with a score between 1-5 in each of these three categories:
· Ease of Success: how easy (or hard) the alternate win condition is to set up
· Ability to be Disrupted: how easy (or hard) it is for opponents to stop you
· Tilt: an extra point bonus to weigh the other aspects of the card.
Let’s look at the Alternate Winning Conditions, and which are the best and worst.
Honorable Mention: Amulet of Quoz
Ease of Success: 1
Ability to be Disrupted: 1
Tilt: 1
This is technically an alternate win condition, since your opponent has a chance to lose the game. But it only works against one opponent, so it only works as an alternate win condition in duels (much like Door to Nothingness). You can lose just as easily as win, barring things like Krark’s Thumb. It can be used once, and then is gone. Finally, it can’t be used if you’re not playing for ante.
This is a crappy card. I just included it for fun, and will not consider other “You Lose” cards, or cards that keep you alive (Platinum Angel) or those that kill you (Forbidden Crypt) or those that cause ties (Divine Intervention).
#14: Celestial Convergence
Ease of Success: 1
Ability to be Disrupted: 1
Tilt: 1
It’s just as bad as Amulet of Quoz, really. After playing it, seven turns have to pass, giving your opponents seven turns to find an answer. If you are even alive then, the winner is the one with the highest life total…. Which might not even be you. This is an awful card, and you shouldn’t play it.
#13: Near-Death Experience
Ease of Success: 2
Ability to be Disrupted: 1
Tilt: 1
If you like cards like Worship and Angel’s Grace, then you will love this janky, way-too-white card. Otherwise, this is awful.
It’s very hard to set this up without dying. Most of the better alternate win conditions can win on their own (Darksteel Forge, Helix Pinnacle, eventually Mortal Combat) without much addition to your deck. This one, you have to build your whole deck around. I’ve built decks where a Coalition Victory or Test of Endurance just slides in nicely, but this one is downright ugly.
#12: Now I Know my ABC’s
Ease of Success: 2
Ability to be Disrupted: 1
Tilt: 2
It’s a little easier to get this one off than Near-Death Experience… but not by much. It’s a fun card, no question — your opponents won’t see it coming until you drop this. However, once this is down, your opponents will start looking for ways to off that Teferi’s Puzzle Box or Kaijin of the Vanishing Touch. It will be tough to get back to your turn intact with both the enchantment
and
the cards you need for the combo.
#11: Barren Glory/The Cheese Stands Alone
Ease of Success: 2
Ability to be Disrupted: 3
Tilt: 1
It’s not easy to get off at all, and it leaves you in a very naked state if your opponent has a Disenchant. However, barring enchantment removal, it’s very rare that your opponents will be able to
add
permanents to your board. Unless they have something like Rainbow Vale, you’re probably not going to have problems setting up. Thus, a score of six seems appropriate, overall.
#10: Felidar Sovereign
Ease of Success: 4
Ability to be Disrupted: 1
Tilt: 1
It’s easier than Test of Endurance to get off, and it’s a 4/6 vigilance lifelink creature — it can swing and block. However, that means every color has a ton of ways to kill it. From Mind Control to Shivan Meteor, Fissure to Terror, Oblivion Ring to Desert Twister — there are answers. In addition, the win conditions that involve life totals are very subject to burn spells and attacks… and people
will
try to knock you down. That makes this is hard one to win by.
#9: Epic Struggle
Ease of Success: 2
Ability to be Disrupted: 3
Tilt: 2
It’s not the easiest thing in the world to control twenty-plus creatures for a full turn with an Epic Struggle on the board — you’re broadcasting to the world, “I WILL WIN IF YOU DON’T KILL SOME OF MY GUYS!”
A lot of decks look for cheap ways of generating token creatures — but if Wrath of God and Damnation don’t get you, Pyroclasm and Infest will. Even an Arc Lightning can take you from twenty-two guys to nineteen… And that’s if they don’t have the Disenchant. It’s just a hard combo to get off because creature removal is rampant, and board-sweeping removal is especially common in multiplayer.
#8: Mayael’s Aria
Ease of Success: 4
Ability to be Disrupted: 1
Tilt: 2
All you have to do is have a creature with a power of twenty or greater in your upkeep — and there are loads of those, from Lord of Extinction through Serra Avatar. However, that makes this weak to a simple removal spell, since anyone can off your creature and prevent the win.
Plus, the Aria is a three-color card, making it nowhere as easy to slide into your decks as Helix Pinnacle or Forge[/author]“]Darksteel [author name="Forge"]Forge[/author]. I did give it an extra tilt bonus because it can do other things for you besides win the game, so the card can help keep you alive to go off later. But as a win condition, it’s just too easy to disrupt.
#7: Mortal Combat
Ease of Success: 3
Ability to be Disrupted: 2
Tilt: 3
Getting a stocked graveyard is not hard at all when you have decks that are bigger than sixty cards. Take a look at things like Traumatize, dredge, Buried Alive, and my personal favorite — Morality Shift. I used to win with that card
so
much in Abe’s Deck of Happiness and Joy; Recoup my Living Death, and here we go.
Admittedly, your opponent can Bojuka Bog your graveyard, or drop Tormod’s Crypt against you, but usually that’s not happening and it’s pretty safe. On the other hand, it takes cards to set up, and by its own — it’s not that hot. It’s not my best friend or anything.
#6: Forge[/author]“]Darksteel [author name="Forge"]Forge[/author]
Ease of Success: 3
Ability to be Disrupted: 4
Tilt: 2
This is a great card — it’s hard to kill thanks to its indestructible nature. Problem is, it takes
twenty turns
to win. That gives people a lot of time to a) find an answer, or b) to kill you. Even a simple Boomerang will act as a super-Time Walk.
By itself, it’s just not too great. It scores nine points, because it takes too long to go off. On the other hand, its kill condition relies on itself, so there’s nothing to disrupt — no creatures for your opponents to kill, no graveyard for them to empty, etc. Combine it with cards like Coretapper and Gilder Bairn to gain a lot more counters (or even the new proliferate mechanic — T.F.), and then it becomes something serious.
#5: Chance Encounter
Ease of Success: 3
Ability to be Disrupted: 3
Tilt: 4
This card shines is in its ability to easily rack up ten counters. Many decks can give you several coin flips, thus giving you several counters on this quickly. It’s a great card for red decks because it does nothing by itself — and your opponent may be focusing on other cards, like Karplusan Minotaur. This is easily one of the better alternate winning paths.
#4: Helix Pinnacle
Ease of Success: 2
Ability to be Disrupted: 5
Tilt: 3
With shroud and just one mana, this can easily be played past counter shields and avoid Disenchants. Only enchantment-sweeping removal can take this guy out. Meanwhile, whenever you have extra mana, add some counters. At the end of Ben’s turn, add some, and then untap and take your next turn. It will take a while to add counters, but it is much better than Forge[/author]“]Darksteel [author name="Forge"]Forge[/author] because you control the rate of counters. At ten points, this is definitely one of the higher rated cards in today’s class. Take another look at it.
#3: Battle of Wits
Ease of Success: 4
Ability to be Disrupted: 3
Tilt: 4
One of the easiest and best alternate win cards. It is hard to disrupt, barring a Traumatize, without taking out the Battle itself. It’s good enough to win tournament games — just build a big deck that has enough search to pull up the Wits consistently. This eleven-point card is one of the easiest and best ones to get off, so good luck!
#2: Test of Endurance
Ease of Success: 4
Ability to be Disrupted: 3
Tilt: 4
This is one of the best alternate win conditions. It may require more life to trigger than Felidar Sovereign — but it also has none of the Sovereign’s weaknesses. As a life trigger, it can still be impacted by burn and other things being hurled at you, but you can respond with life gain spells. Life gain is much cheaper than burn. Simple spells like Feudkiller’s Verdict, Soul Warden, Congregate, and Angelic Chorus can ride that life total to levels well above fifty. Then you drop this, survive for a turn, and win. Many White decks already want to gain life, and this slides in very nice alongside them.
#1: Coalition Victory
Ease of Success: 4
Ability to be Disrupted: 5
Tilt: 5
This is, in my opinion, the best alternate win condition ever. It has several things going for it. First of all, because it’s a spell, the only way you can stop it is by countermagic (or instantly killing a creature or land that would otherwise cause victory). That’s pretty good.
It also comes out of nowhere, after other cards have been in play for a while. There are no strong signals that you’re playing the Coalition; in these days of 5-color control decks, seeing a few gold creatures and a wide mana base isn’t necessarily a sign. Plus, it’s not that hard to get all five colors and basic land types. You don’t have to play Reaper King or Transguild Courier or Shyft anymore — not since Alara block with all of its gold goodness.
Will there be alternate winning conditions in Scars of Mirrodin besides poison counters? What about an enchantment that does this:
During your upkeep, each opponent gains a poison counter.
I think that’d be cool.
As they’re currently design, poison counters rank be around #11 on my list. They’re clunky, hard to get in many hits, but better than crap like Near-Death Experience. You can find a deck in the Appendix that uses poison counters, and it’s rather difficult. You used to have to jump through a lot of hoops in order to get your poison in. Obviously, today cards like Whispersilk Cloak might be better.
Building around an alternate win condition is not always going to work. Sometimes, you have to sacrifice too much. I feel like the best times to put one in a deck is when it already is doing something else, and they fit. For example, if you have a deck with Coretappers and untappers like Aphetto Alchemist already in it, why not add a pair of Darksteel Reactors? If you have a life gain deck anyway, why not look at Test of Endurance? If you have a coin flipping deck already, why not add Chance Encounter? Some of these alternate victories are easy to slide into existing decks.
Coda
Unfortunately, this will be my last article for StarCityGames — at least for now. I’ve really enjoyed my time at SCG and meeting all sorts of people. Through this column, I met many of my friends and I have enjoyed every article, every week, and every e-mail and forum post any of you have ever made. I try to respond to most of them and I take them all to heart. After all, if you take time from your busy schedule to tell me something, it must be important. Never forget how awesome Magic is, and never forget your casual side.
Never forget that although we try to win, that Magic is more than just a mere game. It’s not Tic-Tac-Toe or Chess. It’s beyond those games. It creates a community that we are all an important part of. So, for now, it has been a true honor to write for you.
Until later,
Abe Sargent
Appendix
Today’s flashback deck was published here on March 10, 2006. It was published in one of my daily articles for the site —
A Deck a Day
. Let’s take a look:
