MTGNexus

hyalopterouslemur wrote: ↑

2 years ago

Hermes_ wrote: ↑

2 years ago

I thought there was a combo with Power Surge there wasn't at least I couldn't find one.

Damned if you do, damned if you don't? (I prefer Citadel of Pain to Power Surge on "at least it does something" grounds. It sideways hoses blue.)

If you have a lot of taxes or a lot of mana rocks/dorks, that's another way to make it asymmetric. Or just lifelink d00dz. Or just give yourself absorb 1

Really need to add power surge to WB Kaalia and Korvold. That's genius.

I've seen a couple Plarrgforger decks, but I've never seen anyone cast Augusta.

I added Plargg, Dean of Chaos // Augusta, Dean of Order to my Samut deck recently, but I've only had the chance to play it once so far. Plargg was fine - my deck isn't really built to take advantage of rummaging, but churning through the deck is still nice. Plargg's second ability is the main attraction - five mana is a bit expensive, but free spells are always good. On the flip side, Augusta's ability to untap all my creatures also seems quite nice. Combined, the pair offer a lot of flexibility - a useful tap ability in a vacuum, or a way to reuse all my other tap abilities if I already have several active. I'm not sure if they'll stay in the deck long-term, but they're a unique enough effect that I suspect I'll be testing them for a while before I can form a firm opinion.

Aka Dirk Gently's favorite thing of 2021.

I think this nut is still yet to be cracked. Definitely one of the most compelling boros legends ever printed.

This is even better in the 99. All those utility creatures Augusta can untap? Or the things you can do with Plargg and library manipulation?

3drinks wrote: ↑

2 years ago

I think part of the problem is that the cards are so drastically different, I can't imagine a deck that wants both.

Plargg, while not bad, doesn't seem particularly abusable. Sure, he plays what he hits, but with the mana restriction, your not cheating mana. Your paying 2+ mana to draw and immediately play a cheap spell, but without library manipulation, it may be a crapshoot as to what its going to be. I guess if you want a rummager for some form of GY deck, with the added bonus of his second ability for when you have extra mana and need to draw cards.

Augusta, meanwhile, seems to want creatures with tap abilities to double up on, as well as at least one creature that can attack (because a trip into the redzone would likely end poorly for her).

Then there is the limiting factor that even if you only want 1 side, your color identity has to include both.

It's not a bad card. It's just 2 very niche effects that seem to require a good amount of specialization for a somewhat low payoff. Definitely not powerful enough to build around, but so specialized and with enough limitations that it is exceedingly rare to find a spot where its worthwhile. Maybe Osgir, the Reconstructor wants this?

Wednesday, October 13th, 2021; Conspicuous Snoop

3drinks wrote: ↑

2 years ago

This format has a lot of dumb sh*t to offer, but Conspicuous Snoop + Goblin Recruiter|VIS will never get old, if you ask me.

I really like this card. Reminds me I need to make a Gauntlet of Might deck, and maybe that deck is Grenzo, Havoc Raiser goblins & taxes? Hmm. Seems maybe more fun than a more generic goblin commander.

This made me want to look for goblins with activated abilities,.and there are 139, but some are silver-border, unlikely to be used in goblin tribal, or the abilities are just bad. Still, a dozen or so caught my eye. Including Raoul Duke and Goblin Welder, but wven more mundane ones like Arms Dealer

It's kinda a modern breakout (c'mon guys, Kiki-Jiki is a goblin....) Cool.kinda card to see.

<conspicuous> HEY GUYS I THINK CONSPICUOUS SNOOP MIGHT BE GOOD IN GOBLINS </conspicuous>

Anyway, Snoop is a solid card - two mana for a Future Sight effect is a bargain. The fact that it only works with goblins obviously limits it (outside Conspiracy shenanigans), but if you're playing 30+ goblins it will be amazing. Throw in the combo potential alongside stuff like Goblin Recruiter and Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker, and you have a very solid package.

...if you're not goblin tribal, I'd probably pass. You could theoretically set up some combo wins with a relatively small number of goblin cards and Goblin Recruiter, but even 4-5 card slots still seems like a lot.

I find my EDH goblin decks fall into 2 categories - mediocre or "ultimately breaks down into Krenko degeneracy". This is good for either of these, but sadly it's not pushing me into a 3rd category.

Thursday, October 14th, 2021; Forbidden Alchemy



Such a great card. Sad it doesn't see the play it used to. It never stopped being good...I blame zoomer players, tbh.

Forbidden Alchemy does a lot of things - it provides card selection at instant speed, it fills the graveyard, and it has flashback so you can do it again or mill it for value. Unfortunately, the full package is a bit on the expensive side - I can see situations where I would be willing to pay an extra mana to make Impulse mill the extra cards, but ten mana for a Dig Through Time that mills is too much. It also suffers from the fact that blue has a lot of options for card draw - Memory Deluge and Fact or Fiction do similar things, as does Deep Analysis. I'm sure there is a deck out there somewhere that exactly wants Forbidden Alchemy, but off the top of my head I'm not sure what.

The flashback and instant speed are nice! But I have a hard time justifying that 3mv when I have Strategic Planning and Ransack the Lab in the same colors. I use Grapple with the Past and Grisly Salvage in some green decks. I have used Vessel of Nascency in enchantress for various synergies, but I usually feel bad because I could do more with three mana.

Love this card. You put one card in your hand, essentially mill 3, and break up what I call the "Sylvan backlog": Having a card like Sylvan Library, if you know the other two cards are definitely not what you want, this mills them away so you'll have three fresh cards.

Solid in decks that either interact with the graveyard, or play a control game. A little weak on the raw card advantage, but gives good selection while providing late game value.

3 CMC for no card advantage is a bit of a tough sell - this is an instant, which is great, but it competes for space with Read the Bones Chart a Course, Notion Rain, and Night's Whisper as generically powerful draw spells, with Thirst for Knowledge and Thirst for Meaning as more specialized draw spells. If you are okay with only replacing it and are more interested in digging or in efficiency, this is competing with Frantic Search, Impulse, Strategic Planning, Ransack the Lab, Discovery // Dispersal, and Corpse Churn as digging/grave-filling tools (nevermind the usual blue suspects of Brainstorm, Ponder, Preordain, Consider, etc., etc.). And we're just one mana behind gold standard superstar Fact or Fiction which digs one deeper and can often draw more. And all that's just in Dimir - add more colors and we see even more powerhouse options.

This shines in a few places:

- If you are building around Flashback. Sevinne, the Chronoclasm sorta corners that market these days but I briefly played Crosis, the Purger Flasbback control and some folks still run Dralnu, Lich Lord or Kess, Dissident Mage decks based around the mechanic. The 6B price tag is steep, but at least it gives you the option.

- You want to very selectively fill your grave quickly, like in Araumi of the Dead Tide or newcomer Ludevic, Necrogenius // Olag, Ludevic's Hubris.

It's a solid, but not amazing, card, and one of those effects that used to be "one of the best in class" but that has been slowly powercrept over the years even though nothing is necessarily strictly better than it.

Friday, October 15th, 2021; Deathbellow War Cry



Well......at least it's a red tutour that puts multiple cards onto the battlefield.........

More than Sethron, Hurloon General and Moraug, Fury of Akoum, I feel like this is what put Minotaur Tribal on the map in EDH...and by "on the map" I mean "finally broke the 600 club barely". Considering that minotaurs have access to the dreaded Trample + Deathtouch combo on their lords this lets you hit that plus two more bodies.

It's still an 8 mana spell that won't even necessarily win the game on the spot the way that Cyclonic Rift or Expropriate would, so that's sad, but it is funny at least.

There are about 16 minotaurs I would consider playable (excluding ones like Etherium-Horn Sorcerer that you'll want to cast on your own and Zedruu the Greathearted that really require their own deck). Enough to make this viable, but not enough to make minotaur tribal viable, not least because some are two or three colors, when I typically see minotaur tribal as first red, then black, then maybe a third color (usually white).

It gets Masked Vandal so seems okay

Remember when this card was pretty expensive? Me too, and I can't understand why.

RxPhantom wrote: ↑

2 years ago

Remember when this card was pretty expensive? Me too, and I can't understand why.

"line goes up" Reddit jerks.