If a mana drain is misdirected to target the misdirection, does the caster of the drain get 5 mana?

@Jacob,

When I was new at vintage, you were the one I turned to first because you had just won with a cool new deck. However, I talked to both you and Smennen on AIM, and both of you immediately blocked me. I was very polite. I don't remember what questions I asked, but I definitely know how to carry myself around people I'd like to get to know. My AIM name is digitalfobulous.

As far as Jacob being one of the nicest guys on TMD, I'm not really sure where that's coming from. 2 years ago, when I started becoming really serious about T1, I remember IM'ing jacob after he won the SCG with meandeck oath. He simply blocked me on AIM, and refused to have any contact with me at all. I can't really relate to jacob, but if he has such a strange attitude towards people especially from TMD, that's really terrible, and says something about his personality.

I was a bit pissed when I learned that the cards I had given to Roland were not going to be used by him, but instead, were going to be used by Jacob, but whatever. That's Chang's call. Chang is a nice guy, but I can't say that I can say the same about Jacob.

I'll start:

I've given Roland:

1 Unl Mox Pearl
4x Beta Sinkhole
4x MM Signed Bstorm
4x Fow
1 Japanese Yawg's Will

Definitely donate, guys. Although Roland won't have trouble playing stax for gencon, it will still be important for him in the long run to get what he lost. Keep it up!

1) Yawg's will is too slow. You cannot play it at any time, especially not usually within the first 1-3 turns.
2) Yawg's will is too dependent on other cards to be good. It's dependent on what you have in your yard at any given point in time, and gets better as the game progresses. Tinker can be played very early in the game, and brings the clock of the game much closer to completion in your favor.
3) Yawg's will is black. As such, you need a sea, lotus, or jet to play it. Although this may be a minor point, this is not to be overlooked. The inclusion of seas will weaken the mana base for a possible waste, and makes the deck more dependent on fetches and the successful resolution of the popping of fetchlands.
4) Tinker is blue. It can be pitched to fow.
5) There are a vast array of useful tinker targets, making it as much of a utility card as it is a solution. Memory jar, DSC, sundering, trike, lotus, trinisphere, smokestack, are just a few to name.
6) Yawg's will is better because of tinker, not the other way around.

Tinker is fundamentally better than Yawg's will for the simple reasoning why lotus is better than ancestral. An enormous tempo boost is superior to card advantage. These differences are key, and people need to know the reasoning behind why certain broken cards are better than others in order to better understand the fundamentals of the game. Post your opinions!

A Phil Stanton type of analysis would not be applicable here because of the prices. Yes, I totally agree with Harlequin in this. Just because a card is very played does not mean that it is a staple that is imperative of the game, as the black lotus results show. Cards like DT and Vamp and Mystical will never make Top 15 of this list because they are good solely because of the presence of other much more broken cards. The list should be like this:

1) Black Lotus

.
.
. (huge gap)

2) Ancestral Recall

(big gap)

3) Mox Sapphire
4) Time Walk
5) Mana Crypt
6) Mox Jet
7) Mox Ruby
8) Mox Emerald
9) Mox pearl

(big gap)

10) Tinker
11) Yawgmoth's Will

Tinker and Will are included in decks that already have all of the above.

1) Black Lotus
2) Ancestral Recall
3) Mox Sapphire
4) Time Walk
5) Mana Crypt
6) Sol Ring
7) Mox Jet
8) Mox Ruby
9) Mox Emerald
10) Mox Pearl
11) Tinker
12) Yawgmoth's Will

Yes, believe it or not, mana crypt is fundamentally better than Sol Ring or any of the other moxes. Although Tinker and Yawg's Will are great cards, they still don't even cut into the top 10 cards that are considered the staple of the staple in vintage. A look of recent decklists from waterbury or SCG will verify this claim. What do you guys think?

I think that TK or Roland will win.

I've donated a mox pearl unlimited, 4x beta sinkholes mint, set of FOW's mint, set of bstorms signed, and a japanese yawg will to Roland. Everyone else please help out as much as possible.

Thanks, Roland for the clarification. To confirm, Roland and I did indeed have a long conversation last night, and we went over our stories together again. I really appreciate him being open about this and letting the public know about every step of the process. This way, everyone can work together and find out who thief is, watching out for his cards, etc. I encourage everyone to attend iamfishman's tournament, because the funds will be directly donated to Roland and Jacob. I would go, but MA is simply too far away, and I recently sold my deck to fund my other interests. Roland is a good man, and I respect his bravery in this terrible situation. Again, I apologize for my words yesterday as they were said out of frustration and intimidation.

Why Elias would ever accuse me of being banned from Neutral for stealing is beyond me. He is welcome to search the records for himself, as they are written clearly in the Neutral Ground computer database. He is also welcome to ask Dameon, the manager, if I, Ici Li, was ever banned.

The fact that Elias would accuse me of something on an internet forum before he checked it out for himself is completely beyond me, and changes my view towards him entirely. Before I recieve a formal apology from Elias on TMD, I will not rest my case. This not only tarnishes my name for an action I never committed, but everyone knows that selling cards in Neutral is a very common thing, and as such, is much less severe. Sometimes, it's simply a matter of whether or not the invidual is smart about it or not. I have never ever stolen cards in my life, let alone steal from my friends. It was also this inital false accusation that led to Roland and Josh falsely believing that I was the thief in the first place.

Are you a complete idiot? Please don't do this. - Bram

Read my above posts.

Seriously, you guys are beginning to hop on each other's bandwagons.

My name is Ici Li, and I'm currently a rising junior at Columbia University in New York, studying Computer Engineering and minoring in Applied Mathematics and Economics. I started playing magic when Mirage arrived on the scene, stopped when the rath cycle rotated out, and came back in after Mirrodin when vintage boomed.

The first decks I played were Oath and Stax, but now, I consider myself to be a very competent CS player, who often plays with Rich Shay and Roland Chang on MWS, almost weekly. I also have contacts with other top players such as Jesus Roxas and 13Nova. I believe that storm-based combo and stax are inferior decks, and control will forever reign as the superior archetype. I personally owned a fully-powered CS deck for quite some time before I sold my collection to fund my other interests. As far as formats that I play, I play strictly vintage, but recently have bought a few standard packs for drafting. Even without my cards, I continue to practice on mws, playing a few games a day to hone my skills and develop my strategic edge.

I am an expert of rare chelonians (turtles and tortoises), as well as plants, fossils, and exotic fish. My specialty lies in endangered chelonian species native to Burma, specifically, the Burmese Star Tortoise, and the Burmese Mountain Tortoise, both worth thousands of dollars in the reptile industry. I own one of the largest colonies of Burmese Stars in the world, and am rapidly expanding my collection with an intent on future breeding.

I am an avid programmer, and know a great deal about low-level hardware design, implementation, as well as embedded programming in C and C++. I also know a great deal about business and high-level management. I've started two companies in the past, but have not yet applied my technical knowledge as much as I would like to these ventures. I am always excited about new ideas, and would be very happy to discuss them with the appropriate people.

@Roland: Thanks for setting things straight. I accept your apology.

@Kowal: I know what happened. I know that I'm innocent. I really couldn't give less of a fuck if it is people like yourself that are accusing me of a crime over an internet forum that results in the tarnishing my name. Also, you are violating Roland's wish to not point fingers.

When the thief is caught, and Roland's cards are returned, you will be the bumblefuck.


When I said that it was a private matter, I meant helping him out, buying a card etc. Obviously everyone's concerned about roland, including me. At the time I felt so bad for roland's loss that i wanted to help him and buy him (a card ) that day, and i would do more too. It was only because he accused me and relentlessly grilled me with josh that i became offended and felt that he demanded reparations or something, but now that he has apologized and things are set right between us, i feel completely relaxed about helping him out. Again, this is something I will be talking out with Roland, and I really appreciate him setting things straight.

@Elias: Do you know Luke? The chinese guy with the shrunken head. He lives in Flushing. The other guy was a tall standard player. He's a white kid with red hair. I dunno his name.

@Kowal: I will settle this or deal with this in whatever manner Roland and I agree upon, but I will not be influenced by what you, a third-party bystander says. You have no right to tell me what I should or should not feel or do, let alone be a judge in all of this. This is a private matter to be settled between Roland and I, and I will not let him down. Thanks for your concern, but your further input isn't appreciated, thanks.

Josh made the same mistake you did. I was never banned from Neutral Ground, and their documented records in their computer systems won't lie.

You're welcome to check the Neutral Ground banned list records, and you won't find my name in there at all.

@kowal

Hello, guys. This is Ici.

I had a lengthy conversation with both Roland Chang and Josh Meckes today discussing the details over what happened on Sunday. Although Josh wasn't there on Sunday, he was very patient with me and Roland telling the accounts, and made suggestions and asked a lot of questions.

However, apparently, Roland views me as an acquaintance, and not a friend. I understand that Roland wants to get his cards back, however, I do not appreciate the tone of the questions that Roland was asking me today. I have tried to be very patient with him because I know that I would want others to be patient with me if I had my cards stolen, but at the same time I think we should try to pursue other leads and track down the real thief. It is frustrating and somewhat ridiculous that Roland still thinks I may have stolen his cards. After all, my bags were searched, just like everyone else’s who was at Neutral Ground. I will do whatever it takes to clear my name, but threats and intimidation aren’t going to accomplish anything.

Roland, I want to work together with you to get your cards back, but quite frankly I am a little bit fed up with how things went today. Call me when you want to get together at the police station, or if you want help pursuing suspects other than myself.

Thanks,
Ici Li

This is the kind of thing you should be using the PM function for.
-Kowal[/color]

This is Ici.

Look in the other thread. I IM'ed Roland at about 1:00 pm today, and we told me that it would be cool with him to meet at NG at 2:00. I said that I was down, and we met up an hour later.

I am a student at Columbia University. I am a Neutral Ground regular. During the school years, I used to play at the Friday T1 sanctioned tournies. People at Neutral Ground know me: Elias (Sonata of the Cathedral), Josh Meckes, Jostin Rodriguez, Vincent Pau, Erik Wilkinson, and a slew of other Neutral Ground people. I frequent Neutral Ground very often with my friends that I have met there, and Roland is no exception. Ever since I met Roland online about a year ago in a random MWS game, I maintained a close friendship with him. Him and I have met in person on many occasions, even once with Josh and his friend James. We have had dinner together, played cards together in real life, and on MWS on a regular basis. I consider myself a good friend of Roland's. In fact, I hold the highest respect for Roland and Rich Shay in the vintage community.

When Roland went to get a drink, I did not see the white rook case or the deck boxes because I thought he took them with him. The whole point of me sitting down to look at his binder was so I could purchase vintage staples from him. There were three other people sitting at our table, and none of us saw anything unusual. After about 2 minutes, I went to the front desk to grab a pen so I could write down everything I wanted to buy from Roland. When I got back, I sat back down, and started writing down what I wanted. It was only until Roland got back until he realized that the white box wasn't with me, and I realized it wasn't with him.

I was not only with Roland for the entire duration of this time period, but I offered him my help after the incident occurred. For the 20th time, my bag, in addition to his bag, and about 20 other people's bags were checked. Tomorrow, I will get in contact with Neutral Ground staff to review the tapes with Roland. I have already called the building personnel along with NG staff many times today, and I will keep in touch with them tomorrow as well.

This incident has left me with nothing but the deepest confusion about what happened, and my sympathies for Roland. Roland is probably the nicest guy I've met along with Rich Shay, and this incident needs to be resolved.

As we speak, Roland is at the police station, and I will accompany him there as a witness whenever we decide on a common time. This time will be sometime this week. I will definitely keep everyone posted.

All the witnesses at the scene were questioned, and their bags examined, including me. I will probably be getting either 1 to 2 other witnesses that were also there at the scene to accompany Roland to the police station as well. Everyone keep their fingers crossed, and hopefully all will turn out well.

Hello, this is Ici.

I was there with Roland today at Neutral Ground when everything happened. PM's are welcome, but finger-pointing and accusations are not. My bag was checked along with about 30 other people's. This greatly offends me because I am one of Roland's good friends and have played with him both IRL and online for about a year. In fact, I was the one that advised Roland to post on TMD to make a comprehensive inventory of the missing cards.

I've been tinkering around with a CS deck recently with the inclusion of stifle. Stifle seems to be very powerful-- let's see some of the few things it stops:

1) Storm combo
2) Mindslaver
3) Tormod's crypt
4) Goblin welder activation
5) Memory jar activation
6) Fetchlands
7) Wastelands/strip mine
8) Opposing library for a turn
9) Opposing bob for a turn
10) Drain mana
11) Oath activations
12) Smokestack saccing for a turn
12) Tangle Wire tapping for a turn
13) Duplicant
14) Sundering Titan
15) Seal of Cleansing

and so much more.

and many more..

However, my question is, does stifle really belong in this deck? In a deck where survival is the goal, is stifle more of a tempo card or a threat? Sometimes, stopping a first-turn fetch will win the game on its own, but the real problems come from replacing other crucial cards with stifle. I've cut fof, e truth, a welder, and a slaver for 4x stifle. What does everyone think about this situation?

Sometimes, having a stifle in your hand really makes a difference. While they are off FOWing your stifle in response to their fetchland, you have already gained an advantage. Sometimes, it is good having one when grim long is going off. In addition to the counters you already run, you have yet another way to deal with the threat of storm. In a metagame with so many activated and triggered abilities, the ability to stop some of these threats can be enough to tilt the game completely in your favor.

Here is my decklist for reference:

Maindeck:


4 Mana Drain
4 Force of Will
4 Brainstorm
4 Thirst for Knowledge
1 Ancestral Recall
4 Goblin Welder
1 Rack and Ruin
1 Mystical Tutor
3 Stifle

1 Demonic Tutor
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Tinker
1 Time Walk

1 Memory Jar
1 Mindslaver
1 Darksteel Colossus
1 Triskelion
1 Tormod's Crypt

1 Library of Alexandria
1 Tolarian Academy
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Emerald
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Crypt
1 Mana Vault
4 Polluted Delta
1 Flooded Strand

3 Volcanic Island
2 Underground Sea
4 Island

Sideboard:

1 Echoing Truth
2 Rack and Ruin
2 Duress
2 Red Elemental Blast
1 Sundering Titan
1 Stifle
1 Tormod's Crypt
3 Claws of Gix
1 Fire/Ice
1 Chain of Vapor

More arrogance.. heh

Timetwister is the worst art of all of them. No one cares.

What card is one supposed to cut for jar? Anymore than 4 big artifacts is kind of clunky, is it not? Just a question.

Rich, what did you think of 25 mana sources as opposed to 26? Were the 3 islands enough?

But you said that you'd never go below 4 welders...

Absolutely not. All of CS's lands had better be producing mana, if not blue mana. No turns can be wasted that will delay the crucial UU CS needs to drain. The waste of a land drop for a card that would otherwise provide an inferior discard ability with the advantage of being uncounterable is not worth the slot it would replace. Rack and ruin, echoing truth, mox monkey, etc are there to remove the pesky shits that clog up CS's game plan if it becomes necessary. CS doesn't need anymore solutions that are available to it. It simply needs a well-defined CORE on which a deck can be built on top of. The SB and remaining 11 cards can be appropriately meta'ed.

Good post, Rich. I totally agree with you on the welders. Also, you didn't address your opinion of the mana count. What do you think of it? 25 sources? 26 sources? Pentavus vs COW/strip lock? What do you prefer? Also, why does the deck NEED 2 mindslavers? Isn't an artifact fattie instead of the second one enough?

True. I forgot burning wish, and I edited the other mistakes before you replied. Rich Shay does not play with mystical. Many other leading CS players today do not play mystical either. Mystical is not necessary for the essence of CS. In today's stax-heavy meta, and fight for board control, anything less than 4 welders is sub-optimal, considering the number of artifact fatties that cannot be otherwise cast unless via tinker.

CS has recently become a topic of huge debate. As a result, I would like to start a discussion that includes the CORE of what a CS deck consists of. A core is defined as a set of common cards that are absolutely imperative to the essence of what defines CS. Other than the mana base, which may be off by 1-2 cards depending on the build, every card in the spells category is imperative.

spells
1 Time Walk
1 Ancestral Recall
4 Mana Drain
4 Force of Will
4 Brainstorm
4 Thirst for Knowledge
1 Tinker
1 Yawgmoth's Will
4 Goblin Welder
1 Mindslaver
1 Demonic Tutor
 
mana 25
1 Library of Alexandria
1 Tolarian Academy
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Emerald
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Crypt
1 Mana Vault
4 Polluted Delta
4 Volcanic Island
2 Underground Sea
4 Island

This leaves 11 other cards that must be included. The mana base is roughly fixed, without taking into account the possibility of the COW/STRIP lock, the exact number of 25 mana sources is almost certainly correct. This leaves the possibility of other choices:

2-3 artifact fatties, which may include:
Pentavus
Platinum Angel
Triskelion
Sundering Titan
Darksteel Colossus
Mindslaver #2


8-9 Metagame cards which have shown up in CS decks in the past. These may include:
Gorilla Shaman
Burning Wish
Fire/Ice
Vampiric Tutor
Imperial Seal
Recoup
Darkblast
Tormod's Crypt
Echoing Truth
Lotus Petal
Rack and Ruin
Mystical Tutor
Fact or Fiction
Intuition
Crucible of Worlds (at most 1)
Deep Analysis
Accumulated Knowledge
Gifts Ungiven
Mana Leak
Cunning Wish
Duress
Aether Spellbomb
Pyrite Spellbomb
Echoing Ruin
Shattering Pulse

Obviously, the SB is completely up to the metagame, and this warrants another discussion that is perhaps even more complex than this one. Just some thoughts about this wonderful deck, that may possibly the best magic deck created of all time.