Like I said before, I think that the Cycling mechanic is a very interesting one and will definitely interact well with existing mechanics such as threshold. Like Madness, though, it appears that Cycling has a few bombs and a few duds. I’ll be taking a look at what I consider to be the best or most interesting cycling card in each color.
“I wonder,” said The Ferrett, ruminating on the uncanny amount of potheads who play Magic,”Whether playing stoned makes it easier or worse. I mean, it’d be more complicated… But on the other hand, everything might fall together. Either way, it’d make a hell of a tourney report.”
I did not know what a madman Ted Knutson is.
Even though The Holy Kanoot had never smoked before, he may (or may not) have actually performed the experiment, ingesting illicit drugs that StarCity does not condone in order to see whether it helps both your play AND your astigmatism. You may not agree with what he did… But after a man makes a sacrifice like that, how can I not publish his findings?
I know, I know. Everybody is going to be doing a set review –
and eventually, you’ll want to swear off reading set reviews altogether. I feel your pain, I really do. Just… Trust me on this one. Before you get burned out on set reviews and Onslaught discussion, try to give me a chance.
Chris Romeo is back… And he’s WRITING FOR STARCITY AT LAST! (Well, after that brief dalliance with MagicCan, but we’ve forgiven him.) If you’ve never read Chris, all we can say is that his set review is more amusing than most. As witness:
Battlefield Medic
There’s a guy like this in every block. And in every block, I use him as a proxy for the really good cards until I can afford them.
There must be a card that changes all creature types. Yup – Standardize. Let’s see – I have more creatures than anyone else. I have six mana, three of it blue. I have Force of Will backup. Standardize, Peer Pressure… I now own all creatures in play, permanently. Want to concede now?
Now, if my last card is anything but Krosan Reclamation, the board will be my 4/4 and 2/2 against his 2/2 potential first striker and 4/4 first striking land, with his Glory in the graveyard. With Joe at twelve life and yours truly at seven, he could race with no problem. Topdeck or no?
Gigapede is perhaps one of the best cards in the set given it’s innate comboliciousness with Violent Eruption, but the card represents a clear sign that Wizards intends for Green to have access to graveyard recursion, at least for now. Genesisseemed a little out of flavour, but was fine due to the whole”Judgement Incarnation” factor. Gigapede, on the other hand, feels like a black card.
Most games involve a lot of swinging with tight men. You know how this deck works: Get threshold, beat face, end game. Sideboard. Repeat. It’s rock-solid, and all you need is one island and one forest. It’s great against other U/G decks because it’s faster, and it’s great against Monoblack because of the sideboard and the fact that it can take Game 1 on a semi-regular basis.
I witnessed a match where one player had a Nantuko Shade and enough mana to attack and finish off his opponent; said opponent was tapped out and had no blockers left on the board after an Edict. The name pro did not attack for the win, instead keeping two mana open in case of an Aether Burst that could not be cast. And yet his play is a lesson to all of us wannabes.
Geordie 8-0’d the Grand Prix trial the night before Cleveland… But what decks did he go through before that precious night, and what lessons did he learn about OBC?
I wanted to build a fun, competitive deck for the occasional MOL foray. And it had to be cheap. Surprisingly, the answer came in the form of an Invasion draft, and it’s a blazingly-fast deck for those who want to goof around seriously.
How do you tweak”The Deck” against aggro? Oscar goes over your sideboarding options when playing Magic’s most complex deck!
Personally, I think that morphing is going to be a staple in decks of the new Standard environment, and that will only proceed to make morphing better.
After what seems like months and months of playing OBC, I finally escaped but with only a week before the Bath Monthly Standard tourney – and not a moment too soon, as Jim learns some valuable lessons about Shvartsman Study!
You can have a lot of fun with Arcane Teachings on some of those old cards that say”whenever ~this~ deals damage to a player,” do something interesting. And do you want to know how to deal infinite damage in a casual deck with a ping combo?
