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1  Eternal Formats / Miscellaneous / Re: New wording for Time Vault announced on: September 24, 2008, 09:38:24 am
With the old wording, you play it like this with rings:

Vault comes into play tapped:
Untap it on untap step (or use key to force it untap): skip your next turn
Activate time vault, rings duplicates the vault's ability, then pay it.
so you take 2 extra turns, but you skipped your next turn, net resulting 1 extra turn etc.

With new wording, you have to skip a turn before you start abusing it, so you got to wait 2 turns before you pull infinite turns with rings.

looks like twiddle etc. is the way to abuse it nowadays
2  Eternal Formats / Miscellaneous / Re: New wording for Time Vault announced on: September 24, 2008, 08:22:32 am
complete garbage, you can't even combo it with rings of brighthearth anymore.
well, it's a two turn before combo instead of one.
3  Eternal Formats / Creative / Re: Suggestions for Improving your Game on: September 23, 2008, 09:44:13 am
To FFY: great 7th point, this is very true and whilst I was aware of your point I am going to actively try to keep my emotions in check while playing. This has already helped me won some games I wouldn't have without your suggestion, so thanks.

Quote from: forests fail you
The point is don't tell your opponent through body language or complaining how or where you are weak.  Represent strength, and your opponent's are much less likely to make low EV plays that blow you out, but rather will be much more likely to play it safe and give you more time when you are losing.

As a personal feel on this mentality, be in CONTROL of your body language, as it can work in both directions. If you always maintain a stonewall'd facade of determinate strength, and you're opponent is doing the exact same thing, there will be very little information conveyed. But add a little variation into your body language depending on your hand, and you can manipulate your opponent to do anything.

Matt McNally oft retells about how he ended up coercing his opponent to cast Balance when his opponent had more lands, cards in hand, and the only creatures in play, solely through mind trickery, and I play exclusively by this philosophy. If you have a hand of removal/counters, maintaining an image of strength will make your opponent play around your hand (store up multiple threats, wait for disruption, etc), but if you're slumped down and looking defeated, they will gladly and eagerly walk into counters/removal that end their plans.

I am reminded of an instance where Ben Kowal was playing Control Slaver against a combo deck, with 4 cards in hand, and his opponent asked him "what cards you have there in hand?" Ben Kowal is a notorious ninja-liar and mind screwer, and he replied "mox Emerald, Mana Drain, Force, Thirst." His opponent assumed this "strong" hand was an obvious lie, and tried to combo out, assuming only one piece of disruption, only to find out that Kowals hand WAS "Mox Emerald, Mana Drain, Force, Thirst." Mind. Trickery.Playing the actor is more taxing and difficult than simply putting up a poker face, but in the end, your opponent will often never know what your hand is, which will draw their attention away from their cards, and let you take advantage of them.

I find that being in control of your gestures and body language can goes both ways.  Say if you weren't keeping your emotions and body language while you are losing, your opponent might start playing sloppy and gives you the leeway to bounce back.  When I am on the winning side, I would perfer my opponent staying calm, Reason why is that it makes me follow through every step I make, taking into consideration of all the possibilities etc., which makes less mistake.  however, if the opponent starts to give me body language that he's losing, I, or others might become sloppy, then you naturally execute your decisions faster, hence leading to play errors.  So this basically brings back to Shay's point, be humble even if you are winning the match by far.

4  Eternal Formats / Global Vintage Tournament Reports and Results / Re: 9/20/08 Mississauga, Canada For Black Lotus on: September 21, 2008, 12:41:46 pm
Other people's decklist:

Kris's UR landstill is just shockwave's usual list.
Lam's list is never exposed Smile

Here is my report:

So i am playing this shenanigan deck that I don't even know how to call it, Rings MUD. The deck is basically abusing Rings of Brighthearth to get infinite mana and infinite draws. I think there are very little people that knows all the combos in this deck.  I haven't touched it for 2 weeks cause of work and hope I didn't scrub hard.

If anyone want to really know how this deck work, I may consider writing how it works.

For Decklist, there is the decklist:

5 Moxen
1 Lotus
1 Crypt
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Vault
4 Mishra's Workshop
4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine
2 Ghost Quarter
3 Ancient Tomb
2 City of Traitors
1 Tolarian Academy

4 Metalworker
1 Triskelion
1 Triskelavus
3 Karn, Silver Golem
3 Street Wraith

4 Rings of Brighthearth
4 Sensei's Divining Top
3 Staff of Domination
1 Umbral Mantle
2 Voltaic Key
3 Basalt Monolith
1 Time Vault
1 Memory Jar
1 Trinisphere
2 Cruicble of Worlds

Sideboard:

4 Thorn of Amethyst
4 Sphere of Resistance
4 Juggernaut
1 Duplicant
2 Masticore

Round one Matt Hensley: (BGW Teeg/Bob thingy)
So I am on the play:
I think he mulled to five
I cast turn one metalworker, he goes lotus, bob withered wretch
Turn 2 I play Umbral Mantle, metalworker swings with lethal and the game ends quick
Game 2: Figuring that he'd have a Null Rod, I side in my spheres and sides out I think some key, top, staff etc.
I open up with turn one trinisphere, then wastes his land, casts Jar and Karn, attack with Jar and Karn etc.
He had a turn 2 null rod that kept out of bay

1 - 0 (2-0)

Round 2 Against Mike (Mana'd Ichorid)

G1: He mulls to oblivion

G2: I sided out 2 crucible, 1 key, 1 mantle, 1 top, 1 trinisphere?  in 4 thorns, 2 masticore
He keeps a 7 card hand, starts with zaar
I wastes, he starts dredging
Therapies my metalworker
I casts staff of domination, he puts light pressure on me as he does not find nacromoebas and just beats with 2 ichorid. I dig with Top to find metalworker and hand 3 artifacts.

Since I have no real solution to beat ichorid, I just build my combo and ignored his other side

2-0 (4-0)

Noah Mono Blue

G1: I open up with a decent hand, 2x workers. I cast turn 1 worker with tomb + mox, he impulses and the worker gets forced. He casts tinker DSC on turn 2/3 can't rmb, think it was turn 2. I play my other worker and resolves, I have a 1 turn clock before I die, my hand was: Trike, Triskelavus, Street Wratih, Voltaic Key and Rings of the Brighthearth. I reveal for all my artifacts, plays Rings, then key gets negated. So at this point I didn't have my infinite mana combo. I just cycle the wraith to get 2 cards, (Time Vault and Umbral Mantle)
I asked the Judge earlier and he said that time vault uses the original wording instead of the errata today, so I just throw the vault and asks if he wants to concede. Then the argument comes up, and then it was rules as the current oracle text. Then I just play Umbral Mantle and swing ftw.
G2: He gets 2 flux and 1 Back to Basics, I scoop. First lost of the day
G3: I open with metalworker, sphere. I play Triskelavus and Karn, while he's slowed, he managed to drain my trinisphere and puts out a flux, which came too late for him. I reveal with my metalworker on upkeep to have the mana I need to keep the karn and sphere alive to secure the game.

3-0 (6-1)

Round 4 Kevin with Dragon/Oath

G1: I open with a decent hand that I can combo off turn 2, I play shop monolith + voltaic key. then I play rings, which gets countered. He pulls dragon + bazaar shortly.
G2: I sided in 8 sphere, 4 juggs, 1 duplicant and sided out most my combo. I lock him hard with 1 spheres, 2 thorns and a trinisphere, I have 2 workers, time vault in play, for 7 turns I drew nothing except a staff on the last turn. He broke the lock and got the dragon. He bounced my time vault, just in case that I pull something random with it, I chain myself and bounces a mox and I get infinite mana and draw from staff/worker. Fails to find a solution

3-1 (6-3)

Jason Pilarsky Mono Red Aggro:

G1: I mulled and I play rings followed by triskelavus. I topdeck time vault. It was getting close as I had 2 tombs and a crypt for my mana source. Given that I don't get dmg from crypt all 4 turns, I win the game, which I did.
G2: I sided out most my combo pieces, as I know that he would have null rod SB. 
I sided in 4 spheres, 2 Masticores, 4 Juggernauts
He mulls He casts null rod, couldn't do much.
G3: He said, I have 2 null rods, wasn't sure if he was bluffing. Instead of going T1 worker I played top trinisphere. in fact he did have 2 null rods and his gathan raiders and factory and friends beat ftw.

After some deep thought, his threat wasn't really the welder, it was the null rod.
I should have sided in the thorns to keep rod out of the bay

3-2 (7-5)

Round 6 Chris with Painter.dec

G1: T1 Metalworker T2 Staff He thirsts and ancestral and could not find a solution.
G2: He plays a land and ruby, I Metalworker and he countered. he mystical for a tinker for on T2. He Tinker DSC, I play Rings, Street Wraith for 2 cards, fails to find combo (Lotus and land). He attacks, puts me to do or die. I get Staff!!!! I tap his DSC with tomb for 2 turns, puts me to 3 life. I have Juggernaut and Karn in hand, I felt that I shouldn't play them as they don't help stall the colossus. I find metalworker, cracks the lotus to stop him from attacking. With 2 Artifact, Rings + Worker Staff, I win the game. His force becomes online this turn, but I draw out my entire library, plays trike (FoW'ed) then multiple rings of brighthearth and trinisphere and shoots for like 50 with triskelavus

4-2 (9 - 5)

Being the highest tiebreaker, as pilarsky went 5-1 in swiss, I slipped in top 8

Top 8: Pilarsky again!

G1: T1 Worker T2 Staff
Then we thought it is best that I concede as he got better matchups against countertop and landstill, so I did, we played for fun anyways.
G2: He said that he'd mull into a null rod if this game was serious. But he didn't and starts off with Razormane. I get monolith turn one, then rings turn two, turn 3 I cast Staff of Domination and Sensei Top to get the win.

(11 - 5)

I think this deck is really fun and I built it so that every piece was a combo. I didn't rely 100% metalworker or the rings, it works in many many ways. In this tournament, in 7 rounds, 4 out of my 5 win matches I went 2-0, and the games weren't long at all too.  I think this deck can be developed more and be improved.

Props:
John for hosting a great tournament
People from States coming up

I liked how the deck beat out Tinker colossus twice in the swiss (both turn 2 casted). Tinker DSC gives me a 2 turn clock, which can happen a lot to find solution.   No SB for Ichorid and managed to raced it. I felt that the masticores were pretty useless throughout the entire day.  They were counter-interactive with welders when you discard an artifact.  Once I get infinite mana, I didn't need masticore to wipe the field, the deck just wins, most likely.

Even thought most games I attempted a transformation, I never casted a single juggernaut.
I figured that most people would have hate such as extirpate hitting staff or rings and over worrying the explosiveness of this combo.

Things I expected for this deck to do which didn't happen:
Crucible lock: well, a chance thing, really
Rings + Wastes to kill 2 lands.  It usually happens in late game, but all games lasted like 6 turns max, cept for 1 game
Win through Voltaic Key: There are 2 combos in the deck that uses key to win, never got out
Abuse Key & Top (+ Rings) to get a crapload of digging.

Street Wraiths were awesome in the deck, period.

Great turnout and tournament.
Not sure if the meta is degrading as there is elves and faeries, which both did pretty well in the past 2 tournaments (and this one).
The faeries deck seemed pretty scary and it had amazing synergy
5  Eternal Formats / Miscellaneous / Re: Rbg Goblins on: February 20, 2008, 11:33:11 am
My old Goblin deck, before Morningtide looked like this during January T1 tourney, placed 10-11 of 64.

3 Wooded Foothills
2 Bloodstained Mire
3 Mountain
2 Badlands
1 Black Lotus
1 Lotus Petal
2 Mox
4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine
1 Rishadan Port
1 Barbarian Ring
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Crypt

4 Aether Vial

4 Goblin Lackey
4 Mogg Fanatic
4 Goblin Piledriver
2 Stingscourger
4 Goblin Warchief
4 Goblin Matron
4 Goblin Ringleader
3 Siege-Gang Commander
4 Magus of the Moon

SB:

4 Leyline of the Void
3 Snuff Out
3 REB
2 Pithing Needle
2 Pulverize
1 Shattering Spree

Wastelands won me most of the games, Main deck Magus is sure fun and blue can't do anything if it drops with a vial.

With the new set, I am thinking of a deck like this:

4 Bloodstained Mire
1 Wooded Foothills
4 Badlands
3 Mountain
1 Swamp
2 Mox
1 Lotus
1 Petal
4 Wasteland
1 Ghost Quarter
1 Strip Mine

4 Aether Vial

4 Goblin Lackey
3 Mogg Fanatic
4 Goblin Piledriver
1 Stingscourger
1 Frogtosser Banneret
4 Goblin Warchief
4 Goblin Matron
4 Goblin Ringleader
4 Earwig Squad
4 Magus of the Moon

I think that With Land and Library disruption is enough to stall and bash your way through.  It would be nice to fit some MD artifact hate.
Earwigs are amazing, the weakness is that it is a pure drain food.  In my playtest yesterday I've had earwig drained, then scryed for 5.

I am deciding on the 6th wastes, I think it punishes those who run the odd basics and can shut them down better.  Since there are over 6 colorless, the magus can turn into your advantage by fixing your own mana.

i still like vials at 3 because warchiefs are sometimes hard to cast with the double red, and the instant magus.  I have 12 cards at 3 cc.

Frogtosser can give an early boost to ringleader, but still deciding

note: i tested 3 colour gobs, it was hard to play with 5 wastes, and warchiefs and tin street aren't the best of friends.
makes the deck more vulnerable to b2b, wastes.  Even will have trouble having magus SB.
I'd just go vandals or tinkerer or sprees.
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