Full disclosure: I grew up in San Diego, and live in Los Angeles.

San Diego:

There are a number of animal based parks that are WORLD famous: San Diego Zoo, Sea World, and Wild Animal Park.  They are all excellent, my favorite is the Wild Animal Park.

San Diego has excellent beaches: La Jolla (shops), Del Mar (surfing), Pacific/Ocean Beach (bars).  You can't go wrong with any. 

For going out, your best bet is the 'gaslamp quarter' which is downtown.  If you show up there and walk around, it is fun.

------------

Los Angeles:

A 'day trip' should involve a lot of planning around traffic.  It is a 2 hour drive, without traffic.  (~130 miles)  With traffic, it has taken 5 hours, easy.  I would say a 2 day trip makes the most sense, or drive home after 9pm to avoid traffic. 

What you want to do here is really dependent on why you want to make the trip to LA in the first place.  It sounds like you have something in mind. 

-------------

TJ:

Safety isn't the same as in the US, but you should be fine going there.  I would recommend dropping the car on the US side and walking across.  You won't need more than 1/2 a day in TJ.  This type of trip often involves walking around the street merchants, trying your rusty high school spanish, and getting cheap/free food and drinks. 

You will have to google it, but there was a change in passport requirements for crossing the mexican border - be aware of these before you plan anything.

If you have more details questions, please PM me - I probably won't check back on this thread.

Have a great time. SoCal is great.

Hey Shawn,

I just saw this.  I am very sorry to hear about the turn of events the past many months here.  Everyone really appreciates what you did for Mtg in socal.  I hope this difficult period ends soon and takes a turn for the better very shortly. 

-Tim

Could you guys edit the first post in this thread to contain all the latest information related to UTOG so people can reference the latest all the time without having to read through discussion about potential changes?

Ringtones were ever cool?

I think this card is terrible.  The color combo is nasty, the effect is only a bit better than duress, certainly not worth playing white, and playing it on turn 2.

I know what he is talking about.  On some black bordered mox sapphires, there is this white mark on the lower right side of the card.  It looks like a problem, but it is simply a printing error.  I wouldn't have believed that myself unless I saw like 10 with the EXACT same mark.

Here is a scan from my own alpha sapphire...

I disagree with both of you...

GAT is not just like oath.  Yes, they both pay 1G for a green card which is a focus of the deck, but that isn't everything.  GAT dislikes playing both Stax and Fish, both strong contenders still. 

Head to head, I think Oath has the advantage.  Against the field, I think Oath has a better matchup against the better decks.

Losing 2 out of your first 3 matches pretty much ensures you won't win any tie-breakers...  It looks like you knew you were playing for respect after round 3 anyway.

The vintage content (aside from Steve who has been doing an amazing job) has been severely lacking.  When the original move is over a year old, I expect the number of accounts to drop as people decide not to renew.

Having said that, Steve is arguably worthing paying for on his own!

You only paid $330 for a beta ancestral anyway.  Maybe next time ask yourself "Is this too good to be true?"

I support this 100%.  I think the article is valuable, and at this point, I haven't seen anyone else step up to the plate and put ideas out there.  I applaud you for picking up the slack others left behind.

As someone more familiar with Oath, I would be very interested to read an article after you took a 2nd hard look at the archtype, formed some conclusions with data, (what worked, what didn't summary) and generally provide your insight on the deck.  I guess only you, after your investigation, will know if there is enough content to warrant a full article.

Thanks again.

Oh great.  So I have to tutor for Burning Wish, which can then tutor for my 'instant' win condition...

by handle...

vroman
smemmen
thug
buehler
atog lord
chains
dozer
elric
orlove
jdizzle
rasko
bram
jp
SCG
moxlotus

Vegeta - you are so smart.  Why didn't you post it since you had it figured out for so damn long?

Koen posted that a long time ago and just mentioned it again...


Why is that again?


Alternative scenario: "I am holding time vault and top deck recall (flame, time walk, fetchland) ... with two untapped, i time walked, untapped, drew a land, fetched, played time vault, passed the turn, drained a tangle wire, forced a needle, drew a land, tapped red and used my 3 drain mana to cast flame, while he was holding a next turn null rod."

I think flame is better for 2 reasons: (in addition to the other good reasons mentioned)

1. The first card of the two card combo costs less mana (2) and the 2nd card costs (4).  The order is reversed for Belcher, and thus does not lend itself to a mana-curve ramp up.  You literally can't do anything useful with belcher until you have 4 mana.  You can dick around with them after 2 mana if you have vault.

2. Vault and Belcher are each somewhat randomly good on their own, but Vault gets the nod against control decks and Stax, which are objectively two of the most played decks.  Flame and Severance cancel each other out. 

Trash into a time vault?  That is really the only win condition you are going to be getting... Maybe a lotus every so often (at the expense of a mox).  If DSC went to the grave, this might make more sense.  For 3 mana at sorcery speed, I am not sure this would make the cut maindeck.

Also, how is 1x Cunning Wish and 1x Burning Wish?  I usually go one way or the other.

Morals have been on the decline for a number of years now...

This is just in-line with what is going on everywhere.  One expecting morals will always be disappointed.

EDIT: Not that you implied this Klep, but violent crime is a single component of 'morales.'

Sure there is an extra step - but there is a trade-off.  Yawg maindeck introduces other problems like drawing it in your opening hand, getting it duressed, extract, rootwater thief, etc.  Adding 1B or U or B to Burning Wish to find it is one of the things you trade-off.  You also lose 1 maindeck spot, and are forced to add regrowth for the factors mentioned above, thus reducing your maindeck flexibility by 2 cards.  Remember, Consulting for burning wish is the same mana investment as a single grim tutor without the life-loss.

Strictly speaking, you only have 4 or 5 cards which directly access it, but effectively, you have 8 in all 3 variants.  It is more complicated than just counting numbers for some of the reasons I mentioned above, but I felt the article exaggerated the 'doubling' of ways to find yawg.

This is misleading.  A short trip through the SCG archives will show your above logic isn't relevant.

From http://www.starcitygames.com/php/news/article/6496.html
and http://www.starcitygames.com/php/news/article/8181.html

In truth, it looks more like this:
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Imperial Seal
3 Grim Tutors

As compared with:
4 Death Wish
1 Burning Wish
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Demonic Consultation

And in original Long.dec:
4 Burning Wish
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Demonic Consultation

From all 3, the one thing I can deduce is that 8 search cards are the right number in these iterations.  Basically, you get to replace 4 burning wish with 3 grim tutor and imperial seal and demonic consultation with yawgmoth's will.  This is obviously pretty good given burning wish's restriction.

I think my analysis here provides a more objective look at the number of ways to find yawgmoth's will.  I would expect, based solely on the ability to find and play yawgmoth's will, that GrimLong will be somewhere between DeathLong and OldLong in terms of pure strength.  Initial estimate = 90% as good as OldLong.

If you feared him brainstorming into a FOW, then your solution of duressing and casting necro the next turn will still yield the same chances of him having 2 FOW.  Also, as you saw, not taking his most powerful card turn 1 ended up losing you the game.

Having said that, I think the deck is really strong, and it is obvious that taking it to a tournament for the first time will surprize most people.  I am most amazed by how many utility card spots there are.  There is really a lot of room for maindeck flexibility, and since (as you mention) there are a lot of maindeck tutors, you can find 1 of's easily.  (like Burning Wish for SB sorceries)  I think this will help make GrimLong significantly better than DeathLong. 

Again, I am impressed with how good your combo mind is... 

Thanks for the article.

Thanks so much Steve.  You have been a great steward of this format and you deserve all the credit for this site. 

Sideboard consideration = minor impact

At least minor impact.  Not sure how many tournies you have to T8 for the centerpiece of a new archtype to be major...

Not sure I agree here.  The pre-restriction meerly says the card is powerful, not the impact its had on vintage.   Going back to Salvagers, I have seen way more Salvagers than Desires in tournaments. 

This may change.  I always thought Twincast sucked, and Erayo has been difficult to build a deck around, but Ideas Unbound may eventually be used somewhere.  I know the list is for current impact, so I don't think it should change, but this card is still on my 'watch list.'

This discussion has already been had here: http://www.themanadrain.com/forums/index.php?topic=23926.0

Do we really need to re-hash all this?

I thought this was a thread about the new set, not about the price of Force of Will...

First of all, force is not a $25 card.  How some people on this thread got to assuming that is beyond me.  PM me, I will sell FOWs at $25 all day long.

If you are playing vintage (which is what this site is all about) then you shouldn't be selling force of wills anyway.  (unless you have extra, in which case you are a speculator / hoarder / dealer and you know it comes with the territory)  If you don't already own them, great!  MAYBE you can get them in like 10 months a little cheaper with the new card face.  Big fuckin deal.

I don't want to get ahead of myself, so I will wait until Wednesday's article, but holy crap!  This could be amazing!  They haven't ever been able to explicitly design for vintage or legacy so I bet they will be rusty, but this could be one of the coolest ways to inject new cards into T1 in forever!

I hope this set turns out to be what I envision it could be...

I have tried a version of 5c Oath, but it is so far from this I won't clutter the thread with it.

I have a couple comments:
1. suppression field should effect 0 cards in your deck (hint: a 5c mana base does not involve fetchlands)
2. you must utilize the best cards from all 5 colors better than you are now (like your inclusion of balance)
3. 5c really shines in the side, where is yours?
4. I know the creature choices are interesting, but I really feel Razia, Boros Archangel is better than Spirit of the Night
5. Lastly, DSC just wins games.  If you go away from the traditional oath styles, then tinker/DSC becomes even better.

Good luck!

Those 4 decks are the exact 4 I always run a good idea through as well.  Oath, Dragon, and TPS are available if the deck 'sticks'.  At that point, you have a pretty good idea of the types of hate to play and to expect in a reasonably powered, reasonably sized tourney.

The answer is that it doesn't fare particularly well.  5 strips v 0 strips makes thoughts like these unfounded:


I think that 'regular' oath is not sufficiently played however, and the concern over that matchup may not matter as much as it did say a year ago...

From the SB posted:

If you want to go this direction, then you effectively waste a turn by oathing out the colossus in the first place! 

The deck is good because it is flexible - it can play oath for colossus, and win in 3 turns or it can play gifts combo and win after the 1st/2nd gifts.  The only reason to oath out the whole deck and krosan back yawg would be if your opponent can win the next turn.  Oathing to 0 cards is very risky, and it would suck to get ancestralled, or get your krosan countered and 'just lose'.  There is a reason this combo is not viable (exclusively).

The obvious stuff:

2 Strand
2 Delta
[Stronger than 4 strand]

1 Island
1 Snow-Covered Island
[Well known improvement on gift pile possibilities]

4 Forbidden Orchard
[With colossus kill, you want 4 ways to give creatures.  A wasteland allows them to oath]

Sideboard:
Darkblast
[Since Welder hoses the colossus win so bad, this is a great post board gifts target]

Any other updates would be personal preference (as were adding Yawgmoth's Will, Krosan Reclamation, and Duress to Oath) and thus I won't get into details... 
Consider:

Main:
27 mana sources
More 5c lands
1 Thirst / Scrying

Side:
Timetwister
Darkblast
3rd Pithing Needle
Rebuild over Hurkyl's
Pyroclasm

They didn't.  They also didn't like Krosan Reclamation.  They also didn't like Yawgmoth's Will.  (all in Oath)

Although, this is a far cry from traditional Blue / Black / green Oath, I am glad to see multiple key components from our build incorporated here.  This looks to be a solid deck -- but I already see a lot of room for improvement.

Perhaps when selected community members stop 'breaking' legacy, we will be graced with Meandeck's commentary.

I would intuition for:
Animate Dead
Dance of the Dead
Salvager

This gives you added flexibility to use animation effects on their creatures...  It depends on the build you are running of course...  Intuitions with thirsts is strong too...