MTGNexus

So what do people think about it? Needless to say land denial remains one of the most disliked mechanic, but there's also very few other ways to slow down land ramp in this game.

I think Salt is an essential ingredient in cooking. Proper seasoning is one of the most fundamental aspects of the culinary arts. Too little salt, and the dish falls flat; too much salt and it becomes unpalatable.

And I think all of the above applies to land destruction and other "Rule 0" deck options in EDH.

As far as some "score" is concerned, I cannot comment. I have never used EDHRec in any fashion, so I have no knowledge (pro or con) about the topic.

The 'land destruction is obnoxious' vs 'land destruction is necessary to counter ramp' argument is cyclical and endless, so I'm going to acknowledge its existence... and then ignore it for the rest of this thread.

Anyway... the salt scores, like all of EDHREC, are a useful tool. I use EDHREC primarily as inspiration - if you build a deck solely by taking the average deck for a commander, you're going to end up with something much worse than if you take the time to hand-craft your deck. However, it is useful to be able to refresh your memory and see if there are any interesting or niche cards you may have forgotten. Similarly, I wouldn't intentionally add or remove cards based on their salt score... but if I'm going to be playing in an unfamiliar meta, I usually try to less salt-inducing decks. First impressions can be important, and while it is easy to add extra salt to a dish later, it is significantly more difficult to remove it once it has already been added.

That said, I will agree with the overall trend of people finding stuff like Scrambleverse, Armageddon, and Mindslaver to be obnoxious - people generally don't like it when their agency is taken away from them, and the most salt-inducing cards tend to be ones that stop people from meaningfully participating in the game.

It does my bitter heart good to see the SLxTWD cards on the list.

Land destruction is in that awkward position of being not fun and boring with casual tables and not remotely good enough for even fringe competitive tables.

I'd also say that the proliferation of treasure mana also makes it a lot worse. You can theoretically lose your advantage too easily because your opponents might still have mana to get rid of whatever you used as your land destruction followup.

I can't tell if Xanathar is on there because he's a D&D character or if it's because he's a horribly obnoxious card...

Igzex wrote: ↑

2 years ago

I can't tell if Xanathar is on there because he's a D&D character or if it's because he's a horribly obnoxious card...

Maybe both? Urza can attest the duality of obnoxious in both design and lore.

I wish wotc would make a stax precon or two. Cards like stasis and winter orb really need a reprint. Stasis even has cool seb mckinnon art.

Some of these salt scores are just bizarre. How come so many people are salty about Smokestack when the odds are they have never even seen the card?

Happy to see Tergrid at a reasonably high include in the 20s.

illakunsaa wrote: ↑

2 years ago

I wish wotc would make a stax precon or two. Cards like stasis and winter orb really need a reprint. Stasis even has cool seb mckinnon art.

Some of these salt scores are just bizarre. How come so many people are salty about Smokestack when the odds are they have never even seen the card?

Tbf, winter orb did just have a print in EMA...it's not that baller ass polar bear art, but it is a modern reprint at least. I really don't think Stasis has any place in these products, and that's coming from a diehard stax player to the bitter end. "gee, I draw my card and pass" isn't something that r&d wants in their games. At least with armageddon and their ilk you can still enter combat, untap any post destruction lands, and meaningfully do [action]. Stasis is akin to watching your sister play Super Mario World, but she never dies because she keeps doing the life trick in Forest of Illusion I.

Cmon man stasis would have been perfect to reprint in the estrid precon.