Underused Cards in EDH

onering
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Post by onering » 4 years ago

I think righteous aura is a good find, but it's a bit narrow. It wants a certain sort of deck to be worth it, and I think you are right that it's pillow fort. Otherwise, it's nice in a meta with lots of Voltron or battlecruiser fatties.

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Sinis
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Post by Sinis » 4 years ago

onering wrote:
4 years ago
I think righteous aura is a good find, but it's a bit narrow. It wants a certain sort of deck to be worth it, and I think you are right that it's pillow fort. Otherwise, it's nice in a meta with lots of Voltron or battlecruiser fatties.
It does shut down those things, but it has some proactive uses, too. Like, if you want to Earthquake for 50, or Command the ENTIRE Dreadhorde.

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Post by NZB2323 » 4 years ago

Kaya's Guile in 1,308 decks. At instant speed it removes all of your opponents graveyards from the game and forces them to sacrifice a creature, which is great against decks where their commander is one of the few creature they run. The other two modes and the entwine ability are just gravy.

dimir charm in 1,951 decks. This card is so versatile. You can use the last mode to filter your library and fill your graveyard, or mess with an opponent tutoring. It can counter any sorcery, and it can kill these creatures:

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DirkGently
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Post by DirkGently » 4 years ago

Easy pick. Not sone niche pet card, but a card that by all rights should be in every deck that can support it. Literally every deck.

gamble.

The card is absolutely insane. It's arguably superior to vampiric tutor: both search anything but leave you down a card for 1 mana. People just don't like the discard because it feels risky. But skipping a draw could easily have the same effect.

Granted, your hand quality is probably pretty high on average after tutoring, but on the other hand gamble offers potential grave value (if nothing else, you've got another card to delve, good odds on a land to crucible, etc).

More crucially, gamble gives you the card right now. This can make a huge difference in terms of ramp value: mountain, gamble for crypt into signet is insane. Vamp tutor into crypt is much less exciting, especially if you don't have a land drop t2.

It can also give you an out to a game-winning board state RIGHT NOW when next turn isn't fast enough.

Sure, vamp is an instant, but that doesn't much matter unless you've got an instant speed way to draw.

And of course you save 2 life. Not huge but every bit helps.

And it's in half as many decks on edhrec, despite costing a tiny fraction of what vamp costs. Ridiculous. I suspect it's just been criminally undervalued by people who fear the risk without bothering to calculate them, and who fail to understand that you can't avoid risks in a game like magic. Every play comes with risks and rewards. Some risks are worth the rewards, and gamble is very obviously worth it.
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Post by materpillar » 4 years ago

Gamble is fantastic. The most satisfying thing I've done with it is to gamble for squee, goblin nabob and then he got hit as the random discard. Not broken like your mana crypt example but it felt fantastic. Gamble did lots of work in mono-R since it has so much less deck manipulation than other colors.

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Post by MeowZeDung » 4 years ago

I often find myself getting Sevinne's Reclamation or Past in Flames with gamble to offset the downside, but even if I need something else entirely the downside is not that great. I think people get scared of the random clause. The fact that you can t1 gamble with a full grip is also a big part of offsetting the downside.
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Post by folding_music » 4 years ago

I think one mana tutoring has a fairly oppressive and samey effect on the game in general, but I'd far rather see Gamble or Entomb than any of the guaranteed Mirage/Visions ones!

Recently I noticed that Citanul Hierophants was in less than four hundred decks. Crazy talk. It doesn't even have to go in a heavy token population deck to be good!

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Post by Sinis » 4 years ago

folding_music wrote:
4 years ago
Recently I noticed that Citanul Hierophants was in less than four hundred decks. Crazy talk. It doesn't even have to go in a heavy token population deck to be good!
It's hard to justify Citanul Hierophants over Cryptolith Rite. I tend to play with both when I play them at all.

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Post by pokken » 4 years ago

You can tutor for hierophants a lot more easily which is nice. I always find the rites/earthcraft decks I make struggle to find them when they need them unless I'm also playing black/white.

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Post by Sinis » 4 years ago

pokken wrote:
4 years ago
You can tutor for hierophants a lot more easily which is nice. I always find the rites/earthcraft decks I make struggle to find them when they need them unless I'm also playing black/white.
I agree. The criteria of "is found by Green Sun's Zenith/Summoner's Pact" is kind of a big deal.

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Post by Gashnaw » 4 years ago


This is kind of a joke but I ran her in my dragon deck and she worked. 9/9 flyer, reduced costs so that at times j only had to pay 1 Mana to cast her, and she would also eat a lot of removal. Sure she may not have been a great card, but people feared the 9/9

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Post by lyonhaert » 4 years ago

Gashnaw wrote:
4 years ago

This is kind of a joke but I ran her in my dragon deck and she worked. 9/9 flyer, reduced costs so that at times j only had to pay 1 Mana to cast her, and she would also eat a lot of removal. Sure she may not have been a great card, but people feared the 9/9
This would be hilarious in a CMC-matters deck with stuff like Morbid Curiosity and Soldevi Adnate. I did used to have a Domain-based kitchen table deck with 4x of Draco, Nylea's Presence, etc.
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Sinis
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Post by Sinis » 4 years ago

Gashnaw wrote:
4 years ago
This is kind of a joke but I ran her in my dragon deck and she worked. 9/9 flyer, reduced costs so that at times j only had to pay 1 Mana to cast her, and she would also eat a lot of removal. Sure she may not have been a great card, but people feared the 9/9
I ran it in Scion of the Ur-Dragon once, because Draco + Tainted Strike is lethal.

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Post by onering » 4 years ago

I like gamble, but the risk simply isn't negligible. Casting it from a full grip means you discard the card you need 14 percent of the time. That's a low, but significant, risk. It also means that it is most reliable early game, at which point Vampiric is often better, as waiting until your last opponents end step to cast Vampiric then playing the card next turn is little different than casting gamble on your turn then still having to wait until next turn for the Mana to cast the spell you fetched. Alternatively, later in the game when you are more likely to be able to cast what you just tutored for, you are also more likely to discard it to Gamble's effect. I really don't want a 25 percent chance of discarding what I'm tutoring 4 when I cast my tutor with 3 other cards in hand. Gamble is at its absolute best when you are drawing enough cards to maintain a full grip or beyond (it's definitely possible to make the drawback negligible), red isn't exactly good at that, and if you can draw a lot of cards then you also likely are able to draw the card Vampiric fetches right away. Even when Gamble is at its least risky, I'd usually rather pay an extra Mana for Demonic tutor.

Gamble is still underran though, but only because it is underplayed in decks that don't have access to black. Plenty of R/x decks should be jamming it in because it is what it was designed to be, a powerful effect that has a significant drawback because it is off color, but the drawback doesn't outweigh getting the off color effect at that strength. I run it in numerous decks online. It usually is great. But I'd be lying if I said the number of times it's bitten me in the ass was negligible.

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Post by pokken » 4 years ago

I think gambling for life from the loam is my second favorite play in edh after intuition for loam, a cycling land, and gaea's cradle.

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Post by Sinis » 4 years ago

onering wrote:
4 years ago
I like gamble, but the risk simply isn't negligible.
I have a funny anecdote.

I played in a game where my opponent had obviously tutored up a combo but didn't have enough mana to leverage the tutors *and* the combo in the same turn, so he was all ready to go, but had to pass the turn. I topdecked Gamble. I wasn't going to be able to eliminate him, and I had already spent my Wheel of Fortune and Reforge the Soul (in my Neheb the Eternal deck), and the last wheel available was Runehorn Hellkite, so I played as many cards as I could leaving 6 up for Runehorn Hellkite, and gambled to discard it so I could activate it.

So, sometimes, it's a feature!

Anyway, there are also some cards where it doesn't matter if you have it in hand or entomb it; stuff like Past in Flames will pretty much let you do what you want to do anyway.

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Post by Gashnaw » 4 years ago

lyonhaert wrote:
4 years ago
Gashnaw wrote:
4 years ago

This is kind of a joke but I ran her in my dragon deck and she worked. 9/9 flyer, reduced costs so that at times j only had to pay 1 Mana to cast her, and she would also eat a lot of removal. Sure she may not have been a great card, but people feared the 9/9
This would be hilarious in a CMC-matters deck with stuff like Morbid Curiosity and Soldevi Adnate. I did used to have a Domain-based kitchen table deck with 4x of Draco, Nylea's Presence, etc.
I had a 5 color Draco edh (I had to treat Draco as legendary but they would also let me run 5 color. Wish I had nyleas presence back then, I was using basic lands too as I did not have my duals yet. It was a bad eck, but fun.

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DirkGently
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Post by DirkGently » 4 years ago

onering wrote:
4 years ago
I like gamble, but the risk simply isn't negligible. Casting it from a full grip means you discard the card you need 14 percent of the time. That's a low, but significant, risk.
Gamble's risks are more visible, but that doesn't mean vampiric doesn't have risks. If, after losing, you look at the next card of your deck and realize it was the card that would have saved you, and you cast a vampiric tutor that game...there's your low, but significant, risk. If you'd cast gamble, you would have drawn that card (obviously it's not that simple since there's a pretty significant butterfly effect, but hopefully you get my point).
It also means that it is most reliable early game, at which point Vampiric is often better, as waiting until your last opponents end step to cast Vampiric then playing the card next turn is little different than casting gamble on your turn then still having to wait until next turn for the Mana to cast the spell you fetched.
I'd say I search for mana crypt a solid 60%+ of the time when my starting hand has gamble. So....I agree in theory but I disagree in practice. Depending on the deck, getting it T1 can make a huge difference, as can leaving open the possibility to topdeck a land (or something else you may need) T2.
Alternatively, later in the game when you are more likely to be able to cast what you just tutored for, you are also more likely to discard it to Gamble's effect. I really don't want a 25 percent chance of discarding what I'm tutoring 4 when I cast my tutor with 3 other cards in hand. Gamble is at its absolute best when you are drawing enough cards to maintain a full grip or beyond (it's definitely possible to make the drawback negligible), red isn't exactly good at that, and if you can draw a lot of cards then you also likely are able to draw the card Vampiric fetches right away. Even when Gamble is at its least risky, I'd usually rather pay an extra Mana for Demonic tutor.
I'd usually prefer to have at least one good entomb-able target (I mean, don't stretch too far, but it's nice to have). 25% isn't ideal, but that's still a 75% chance of success. If it's a card that wins you the game, that seems like a good gamble to me. Anyway, red or not, most decks should have some plan to draw, and you can always sandbag some lands (and maybe you'd want to anyway).

Saying gamble is often worse than one of the best cards in the game (I'd say demonic is probably...#3?) isn't much of a slight. But while sure, late-game I'd almost certainly prefer demonic, the difference between a T1 mana crypt tutor and a T2 mana crypt tutor can be enormous. You wouldn't say that mind stone is worse than thran dynamo just because dynamo is a better draw past the first couple turns of the game - the first turns matter a lot, and you expect that a card as incredible as a T1 gamble will be worse on a later turn, especially when comparing to one of the most powerful cards to ever exist.
Gamble is still underran though, but only because it is underplayed in decks that don't have access to black. Plenty of R/x decks should be jamming it in because it is what it was designed to be, a powerful effect that has a significant drawback because it is off color, but the drawback doesn't outweigh getting the off color effect at that strength. I run it in numerous decks online. It usually is great. But I'd be lying if I said the number of times it's bitten me in the ass was negligible.
Even in RB I'd say it's easily top 4 tutors, and personally I'd put it above imperial seal to nudge it into the top 3. And while I can appreciate people trying to avoid tutors to keep the "spirit of EDH", in an objective sense, any deck is going to be improved by including all of those cards, no matter what it's trying to do.

Not to mention, imperial seal is quite pricey, and vamp and demonic aren't cheap either. Gamble is a quarter of the price of demonic, and an eighth of vampiric. Looking at EDHrec, its pretty clear price has a significant effect on how common these cards are to run, when diabolic tutor is more commonly run than vampiric. Yet gamble doesn't even come close to the top 100, despite a very reasonable price tag.

I've discarded mana crypt to gamble. I've also kept an otherwise great hand with one land and a demonic tutor and failed to topdeck the second land so I could go off. Or used vampiric for my mana crypt and then drew the card I needed a turn later than I wanted it. The end result is pretty similar, but gamble just feels worse. And I think it's those feelings that are getting in the way of an objective analysis of the card.
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Post by onering » 4 years ago

Mostly agree, but gamble doesn't just feel worse, it is worse. Your right that there is a chance that you draw the card you need a turn late because you tutored to the top with vamp or something else, but if you cast it early game that's what, a 1 in 90 chance? Super late, like you've went through half your deck, it's 1 in 50. That actually IS a negligible risk. 1 in 7 isn't. I'm not saying that 1 and 7 isn't worth the risk, but I am saying it's by no means negligible. Once you get to 1 in 4, that's a downright significant drawback, even though it may still be worth it depending on how quickly you need what you are tutoring for (as opposed to waiting to get more cards in hand to lessen the odds you discard what you tutor for). All that adds up to make Vampiric a good deal better. Even going for crypt turn 1, unless you have a signet to cast right away or you kept a hand that really needs to draw another land right away. But none of this is an argument that it's a bad card, or even that its anything less than great, I'm just saying that Vampiric is better, while not necessarily strictly so.

It's true that optimizing a deck would call for maximizing the number of efficient tutors you run, and in that case gamble should be in basically every red deck. But a lot of people don't want to cram every tutor that should be in a deck into their deck, so they may only want 1 or 2 cheap universal tutors on principal, and thus gamble loses out to demonic and Vampiric in RB. There's an argument to be made that, given these players are intentionally not trying to fully optimize their decks, they should run gamble instead of Vampiric or demonic because it isn't quite as good, and thus is more in keeping with the spirit of holding back. I can't say I disagree, but I can see it's easier for some people to limit staples than sub out cards for slightly weaker versions. There's no rationality there, no more than for people who'd rather do the opposite, just preference. There's also the pimp effect, and I think Imperial Seal gets overplayed because of that.

For me, in paper, my excuse is I actually have demonic tutor, but not gamble. Got it in a bulk buy when I first started playing. Online, gamble goes in pretty much all of my red decks. The price difference on modo is pretty insignificant though. I don't take price into account when it comes to edhrec, because not even close to half of those decks are actually built in paper without proxies. Many of them are decks people play on modo or cockatrice. I'd bet that more people play with actual paper copies of gamble than imperial Seal. I'd even bet that there isn't much daylight between how many people play with actual copies of gamble and Vampiric tutor in paper.

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Post by DirkGently » 4 years ago

onering wrote:
4 years ago
Mostly agree, but gamble doesn't just feel worse, it is worse.
I meant the downside of gamble feels worse than it is, whereas the downside of vamp feels about as bad as it is. At least imo.

I agree that, on balance, vampiric is better, but it's pretty close.
onering wrote:
4 years ago
Your right that there is a chance that you draw the card you need a turn late because you tutored to the top with vamp or something else, but if you cast it early game that's what, a 1 in 90 chance? Super late, like you've went through half your deck, it's 1 in 50. That actually IS a negligible risk.
That's only true if you've only got one possible out in your entire deck. Nothing else that will work, no other tutors or draw that could hit that card.

If you need a board wipe, and you've got 6 board wipes and 4 tutors that could hit board wipes, then that's 1 in 9, not one in 90. Not to mention draw spells that would give you a re-roll on hitting one, and potentially increase the odds by hitting more cards. And some games you just need any creature to chump block or whatever, and the odds are very good of hitting something. Or maybe there's on card that wins the game, but a couple that give you several turns of safety, and a bunch that save you next turn, or whatever.

Probably the most common scenario, though, that best illustrates the downside of vampiric and which I'm sure has happened to anyone who plays vampiric tutor very often, is when you're praying for some topdeck to save you because you're going to die on your opponent's next turn, and then the last card you draw is vampiric. Womp womp. With gamble, sure, maybe you've only got 2 other cards in hand, but a 2/3 chance is a hell of a lot better than no chance at all.
onering wrote:
4 years ago
But none of this is an argument that it's a bad card, or even that its anything less than great, I'm just saying that Vampiric is better, while not necessarily strictly so.
This I agree with. I'd run vamp over gamble. But I'd basically always run both.
onering wrote:
4 years ago
It's true that optimizing a deck would call for maximizing the number of efficient tutors you run, and in that case gamble should be in basically every red deck. But a lot of people don't want to cram every tutor that should be in a deck into their deck, so they may only want 1 or 2 cheap universal tutors on principal, and thus gamble loses out to demonic and Vampiric in RB. There's an argument to be made that, given these players are intentionally not trying to fully optimize their decks, they should run gamble instead of Vampiric or demonic because it isn't quite as good, and thus is more in keeping with the spirit of holding back. I can't say I disagree, but I can see it's easier for some people to limit staples than sub out cards for slightly weaker versions. There's no rationality there, no more than for people who'd rather do the opposite, just preference.
me, predicting this response in my last post lol wrote:...while I can appreciate people trying to avoid tutors to keep the "spirit of EDH", in an objective sense, any deck is going to be improved by including all of those cards, no matter what it's trying to do.
I kinda think, besides being slightly worse, gamble also is pretty spirit-of-edh-y for the random element. But there's no rules about what is and what isn't, obviously. Mostly I think it's weird to skip over a $7 tutor to a slightly-better $70 tutor in a deck you're limiting on purpose.
onering wrote:
4 years ago
There's also the pimp effect, and I think Imperial Seal gets overplayed because of that.
I don't think I've ever seen anyone else play imperial seal. Maybe once or twice a long time ago.

Personally I kind of avoid playing mine because it's decidedly un-pimp lol. It's got a terrible anime-ish alter on it. I got it on ebay because it was a bit cheaper and thought I'd be able to have someone alter something less crap over the top, but apparently that's not really a thing...ah, regrets.
onering wrote:
4 years ago
I'd bet that more people play with actual paper copies of gamble than imperial Seal. I'd even bet that there isn't much daylight between how many people play with actual copies of gamble and Vampiric tutor in paper.
Seal is really rare to nonexistent in my experience, as I've said. Vamp is fairly common. Gamble I see occasionally.

EDHrec says there's about 3x as many gambles being played as seal, and 2x as many vamps as gambles. That seems about accurate to my experience (well, maybe overstating the number of seals but part of that is probably people theorizing optimized lists online and making proxies or replacements when building, or never building at all) but ofc it's hard to be sure what the great invisible masses are playing outside of anecdotal evidence. And I definitely can't speak to online play.
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Phelddagrif - Kaervek - Golos - Zirilan

Flux Decks
Gollum - Lobelia - Minthara - Plargg2 - Solphim - Otharri - Graaz - Ratchet - Soundwave - Slicer - Gale - Rootha - Kagemaro - Blorpityblorpboop - Kayla - SliverQueen - Ivy - Falco - Gluntch - Charlatan/Wilson - Garth - Kros - Anthousa - Shigeki - Light-Paws - Lukka - Sefris - Ebondeath - Rokiric - Garth - Nixilis - Grist - Mavinda - Kumano - Nezahal - Mavinda - Plargg - Plargg - Extus - Plargg - Oracle - Kardur - Halvar - Tergrid - Egon - Cosima - Halana+Livio - Jeska+Falthis+Obosh - Yeva - Akiri+Zirda - Lady Sun - Nahiri - Korlash - Overlord+Zirda - Chisei - Athreos2 - Akim - Cazur+Ukkima - Otrimi - Otrimi - Kalamax - Ayli+Lurrus - Clamilton - Gonti - Heliod2 - Ayula - Thassa2 - Gallia - Purphoros2 - Rankle - Uro - Rayami - Gargos - Thrasios+Bruse - Pang - Sasaya - Wydwen - Feather - Rona - Toshiro - Sylvia+Khorvath - Geth - QMarchesa - Firesong - Athreos - Arixmethes - Isperia - Etali - Silas+Sidar - Saskia - Virtus+Gorm - Kynaios - Naban - Aryel - Mizzix - Kazuul - Tymna+Kraum - Sidar+Tymna - Ayli - Gwendlyn - Phelddagrif - Liliana - Kaervek - Phelddagrif - Mairsil - Scarab - Child - Phenax - Shirei - Thada - Depala - Circu - Kytheon - GrenzoHR - Phelddagrif - Reyhan+Kraum - Toshiro - Varolz - Nin - Ojutai - Tasigur - Zedruu - Uril - Edric - Wort - Zurgo - Nahiri - Grenzo - Kozilek - Yisan - Ink-Treader - Yisan - Brago - Sidisi - Toshiro - Alexi - Sygg - Brimaz - Sek'Kuar - Marchesa - Vish Kal - Iroas - Phelddagrif - Ephara - Derevi - Glissa - Wanderer - Saffi - Melek - Xiahou Dun - Lazav - Lin Sivvi - Zirilan - Glissa - Ashling1 - Angus - Arcum - Talrand - Chainer - Higure - Kumano - Scion - Teferi1 - Uyo - Sisters
PDH - Drake - Graverobber - Izzet GM - Tallowisp - Symbiote
Brawl - Feather - Ugin - Jace - Scarab - Angrath - Vraska - Kumena
Oathbreaker - Wrenn&6

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