I think Memory Lapse was made for Public Library as you said, because it can be very political with several people; I will put it in mine--and ashnod's cupon--that is fun and not stupid like the knight of hokey poky (sp?)

Mana base is better.  I agree--I hesitate about the duals if not for the reason that toting 40x20USD --800USD around in a casual deck that cannot be checked easily is just begging to be stolen from.  Besides "sub-optimal" mana producers should be just as good considering the game is a bit slower and there is no blood moon / price of progress / Back to Basics, etc. to deal with.

I agree with the problem about the balancing act--even though Sage Owl is not overly broken--who ever draws it swings the game considerably.

Amuraivel

I'll post my list for for critique...

This is one of the major problems about talking about Vintage in general.
Whenever someone wins a tournament against conventional wisdom--the argument hinges on whether the metagame is a "true" vintage metagame. 

No one agrees on what the metagame is the standard. 

In reality the Vintage scene is fragmented--but it is not that fragmented.  People are playing similar decks in Karlsruhe, Waterbury, Zürich, and Copehagen. 

The Zürich win was in a field chocked full of "typical decks" found in the USA, TPS, Gifts, Oath, Stax, Goblins, UW Fish, etc.

Taking a US win as the standard is a bit chauvinistic considering there are many metagames above scrub level outside of the states.


Amuraivel

I would never file skullclamp under Tried and Failed.


Andreas Ganz fought off some fierce competition at a 80 person 5-proxy tournament in Zürich to take first with a skull clamp powered deck.  I got eaten alive with a kobold-clamp-tendrils deck on turn two.  Skullclamp is broken like most cards in Vintage, and there is a way to make it work--it may not be Tier 1 material, but failed is it not.

Results are here:

http://www.tolaria.ch/decklisten/zuerich231005.html


Don't count out the clampt

What are you trying to do?  Flavor?  But how is that defined?

Do you want 5 tribal decks?  The assignment is a bit tough without more parameters...

Can't you just use Eureka instead of Tempting Wurm?

@Ephraim

1. I guess my critique of your Public Library is that with all the multiples of 4, you may have a lot of symmetric
board positions--like playing a mirror constantly.

2. The mana base is bad...I tried playing with 5C Public Library, and without alot of colored mana floating around I found myself with little to do within the first few turns except for drop lands.  My solution was only using 40 dual lands, which effectively reduces the number of "colors" from 5 --> 2.5.

3.  Don't take this harshly--for it is just a preference --- but, nothing in your Public Library realy excites me;

In that case, I fail to see why it made you resurrect a two month old thread. I'll leave this open for the time being, because I like the public library idea, but don't make thread necromancy a habit, please.  - Bram

 I realize you are trying to use commons, but well these seem like pretty boring commons. 

Precisely why I am building a singleton Public Library.

Obviously, certain cards just don't work or are useless: e.g. blood moon, or energy flux, the Sage Owl..., but
I think this is a great casual format because it gives everyone the same chances as far as card drawing is concerned.

I tried to develop a balanced set a bit spicier than Beta to play with my wife...but the problem was
the deck construction part of the game is just too overwhelming.  There is was also a sense of fairness, that was
lacking--whether this blue card or black card was better (this because the card pool was limited to one copy).

Has anyone else built a public library?..Would you post them for the rest of us?

Round 5 -- FIGHT !
Crusade vs. Divine Sacrament OR Jihad (al-hamdu-li-llaah!) OR Glorious Anthem
Stream of Life vs. Nourish
Wanderlust vs. Maddening Wind
Lure vs. Seton's Desire
Scathe Zombie vs. Organ Grinder OR Lim-Dûl's Cohort OR Bogg Raiders OR Bone Dancer

I need to clarify, which I didn't do enough of (and violation of forum rules). Set is not for newbies per se, rather it is revising and bringing the classic Beta set up to speed by making all the cards at least playable in but in the same vein.


So cards which one you think is better.

Round 4-- FIGHT!
Lich vs. Nefarious Lich
Maddening Imp vs. Nettling Imp
Ancient Silverback vs. Yavimaya Wurm

Round 3 -- FIGHT!

Nantuko Shade vs. Looming Shade

Round Two  -- FIGHT!


Consevator vs. Shield of the Ages OR Pentagram of the Ages OR Panacea

@Nazzdakka:
Complexity is not really an issue, I am merely trying to replicate the same feeling of the original set with some stronger cards.


I will have the Lawn Mower Elves in the set.

Hello Mana Drainers,

I am taking the Beta basic set and revising all the cards.
I have been scouring the net for good, but simple cards to put into the a basic set.

I have replaced clearly sub optimal cards:

Wall of Wood --> Tinder Wall
Flight --> Shimmering Wings, etc.

EDIT:

{I need to clarify, which I didn't do enough of (and violation of forum rules). Set is not for newbies per se, rather it is revising and bringing the classic Beta set up to speed by making all the cards at least playable in but in the same vein.


So pick the card which one you would rather see in a booster.}

I am at the point I need to make choices; hopefully you can give me your feedback.


First Roud 1 --- FIGHT!:

Wild Growth vs. Fertile Ground
Traveler's Cloak vs. Cloak of Mists
Animate Dead vs. Dance of the Dead

Thank's guys; I read the oracle rules, but should have taken a look at some various print editions.

I'll put the Mirrodin Charms (angel feather, etc. into my fun set)

Basic question:

Is it possible to gain more than 1 life per spell cast by paying the activation more than once?


Amuraivel

This is a good start.

I am looking at building a box 'o fun, mostly around creatures and commons based on the standard rules of magic.



Amuraivel

What is "Wagic" exactly is it just cards from a block?

Or is it the top 60 casual type cards?  Are there multiples?

@ Toad: As for the list, je serais très  obligé.


Does anyone else have a list of the "top" 500 magic cards, or "top" 100 creatures, spells, artifacts, &c. type list?



Amuraivel

I am interested in your Wagic box.

I cannot access the lists, can you post them?  THere is a page error.

I just taught my wife how to play (blood-thirsty, card-counting, odds-mising math teacher), but have only a keeper T1 deck. 

Playing T1 is a bit too overpowered to make for a fun casual game with the wife.

I am looking to assemble something akin to Ben Bleiweiss's Big Box, but I would like to keep it to decent cards rather than just one of everything ever printed of circa 700 different cards.


Any ideas or links,


Amuraivel

@Mod please move this to the main forum.  I was not allowed to post it there, but I believe it belongs there.


The Minimum Card Limit in T1

There are 3 fundamental rules to deck construction in Magic the Gathering

The first is the rule that defines the legal card pool of the format.
The second defines the number of any one specific card that can be in a legal deck.
The third sets the minimum number of cards, which must be present in a legal deck.

The first rule is the format.  T1 is defined a priori by the licit use of all Magic editions.
It is this card pool depth and breath, which makes T1 enjoyable to play.  Any adjustment in this department would be the death of T1 and the birth of a new Magic format.

The second rule is a global Magic rule concerning deck construction.  It is a relatively simple rule.  Though limiting the number of any copy to one would be even simpler way to manage card numbers.  A more complex variant would be to allow 1, 2, 3, or 4 of any particular card.

However, I would like to discuss the third fundamental deck construction rule.  The minimum card rule trumps even the 1-4 card rule.  A deck of exactly 7-8 cards would insure a consistent draw every game (but this strategy is not without peril).  In Block and Extended, this rule is not much of a problem, because the card pool is fixed to a certain quantity of cards.  But this does not hold true for Type 1 and Type 1.5.  The card pool continues to grow without parallel growth in the minimum deck size.  The result of this is an even faster Type 1 archetype as decks are distilled out of an ever-growing card pool.  This leads to more efficient decks, (c.f. Oscar Tan’s new card evaluation criteria).

The question is how efficient should decks become?

My answer is where fun is maximized—unfortunately, this is a very subjective criterion, one that would be very difficult to measure within a Magic community—though not impossible, e.g. polling.

A more objective standard would be one that looks for signs of degeneration within the game.  I know many people are reciting the T1 mantra at this point, “Broken things happen.â€?  True, this is another entertaining and unique aspect of T1, but I retort “How often should broken things happen?â€?  If too many of the rules are broken the game is undone.

Conceptually, Magic is a series of interactions, which take place within a fixed framework.  This framework was conceived to give constancy; rules such as drawing one card per turn, one land per turn, etc. were conceived to give the game a logical progression.

It is in the nature of the Type One beast to gnaw at these rules voraciously.  Some decks have succeeded at consuming these rules altogether.





This trend is exemplified by the rise of Mishra’s Workshop based aggro decks. For such decks the 1 turn : 1 mana ruled was dispensed with.  Packing 4 colorless loti and a slew of on-color moxen (BTW: the proper plural for this Latin word is ‘moges’ not the Germanic plural ending ‘en’); say ‘on-color’ because there is no wrong color.  Workshop decks are able to severely undermine the mana constraints in Magic.  I foresee Workshops continuing to be a part of the future because of the acceleration they provide.  This coincides with a move toward artifacts because of the stripping away of the color requirement, another fundamental rule of magic.  

Look no lands!

Another major example is Michael Simister’s
Belcher—the deck contains only two lands.  Not only is he capitalizing on Goblin Belcher’s ability he has succeeded in ravishing the 1 mana : 1 turn rule, which partially underpins Magic.  While this deck is not a dominant deck, it does show the direction of deck building.  

Other decks are getting around the mana requirements (and hence need for land) with the abuse of the graveyard—Dragon, Rector, Bazaar and the ubiquitous Goblin Welder.

Combo decks have always have been a component in the format, but are they taking the lead?  I do not think that combo is dominant yet. However, the prevalence of combo decks can be a barometer for the format.  The reason for this is because as decks speed up—there is a greater need to break more of the fundamental rules of magic in order to keep up with the rest of the field.  Combo decks are usually breaking rules in a massive way.  The metagame has become more ‘comboesque’ as compared to 1997.  Zoo, ‘The Deck’, Suicide Black, and Sligh at least heeded most of the primal rules of Magic the Gathering.

With each new set, Wizards seems to press the envelope at least a little bit.  While this is a completely reasonable thing to do within the confines of a block, it becomes more problematic when possible destructive synergies arise due to the exorbitant size of the Type 1 card pool.  Naturally, the increased size of the Type 1 card pool has provided some answers to problems it has created.  Nevertheless, there does seem to be a trend towards more ‘comboesque’ decks.  And the format has sped up in the last 3 years.

Is it really a problem?

It is hard to say at the moment.  There are a variety of metagames in T1 hence it is hard to speak of a coherent metagame.  However, decks seem to be more ‘techish’.  A new flavor or deck springs up every month.  This is a sign of instability. Magic plays a wider game due to the engorged card pool.  The road to victory leads to the same place: usually by dealing 20 damage, but the mechanisms vary widely.  Sideboards and decks no longer trump other deck archetypes they aim to combat specific decks.  This is because in narrowness one gains efficiency.  The feasibility of narrowness is a direct result of a swollen card pool.  But the multiplicity of deck threat mechanisms makes it tougher for any one deck to maintain consistency.

Therefore, I maintain the larger the card pool, provided the 60 minimum card limit remains in force, will eventually lead to even more erratic encounters.  I think we will see fewer ‘good decks’ and more ‘metadecks’, i.e. decks which perform extremely well in a given environment for a short while until the metagame readjusts.  This phenomenon has the potential to become a problem.

If not 60 how many?

It is clear that no matter what the minimum number of cards in a deck is, the metagame will eventually reach equilibrium, though I hold that that the equilibrium will be increasingly unstable the lower that card limit is.   One of the main ways to make decks less efficient is to increase the minimum card limit.  Indeed, some Highlander variants of Magic have done just this with card minimum limits of 75 or 100.

But, I do not have an answer to the question posed above.  In Block or even Extended, the 60 limit acts s a benchmark, but in T1 it is clear that the 60 card minimum is an artifact of a different time.  While raising the minimum card limit would not be a panacea for metagame imbalances, it could dilute some of the acrid effects of mana acceleration, graveyard abuse, and ‘comboesque’ components by diluting them.

Up until now the DCI has only used the Banned / Restricted list to correct imbalances.  While this is an appropriate tool in correcting some metagame imbalances, it should not be the only tool to used correct metagame imbalances.  It is time for at least some discussion on the matter in an effort to achieve some idea of if and under which conditions the minimum card limit should be raised.

Hello,

1st. I did use the search function.

2. I would like to discuss decklists for Keeper for a completely unknown
metagame.

3. The metagame has most likely little to no power.

4. I have everything except the Lotus--what is the best substitute...Please don't tell me playing Keeper is not possible without it.


I have looked at some the of the new decklists using Stifle, 2 Scrying, 3 Brainstorms, etc.  

But I have noticed that Keeper has given up some of its versatility for redundancy.

My question is basically:

Is Keeper's new form intrinsically good, i.e. worth 'net decking, or is the new Keeper a pure product of a new metagame?




Amuraivel