MENTAL magic!

[Carlos El Salvador]

What are your rules you use?  Here, where I play, we use very strict rules as of late, including some people banning Fastbond.  Here is what I play, minus the ban on Fastbond.

1) NO Search effects.  The group as a whole feel that just makes things a lot easier to do, but brings down the power level for the most part.

2) All Ante cards are banned, that means the most powerful magic card in exsistance is banned.

3) Each player may play each card as itself, I understand there are groups who don't do this, but there are some really ridiculous casting costs to work with.

4) Each stack has approximately five real lands, for broken things like Library

For those of you who don't know the basic rules to Mental Magic, it's a simple game.  You draw seven cards, and can play any card in your hand face down as a 'utopia', a land that can produce any color, and does not count as a basic or non-basic land.  Each spell in your hand can be any spell with the same mana cost, as well as any cards in your graveyard.  Obviously the best way to win the game is usually through some string of spells and comboing, or at least that is how I feel safest.  Does anyone else really still play mental magic?

[JeremM]

I love playing Mental, but the stack we had was made up of old Kamigawa draft junk, so it had some really terrible casting costs (nonsense like XBB and 6U), plus we used the Legacy B/R list to keep the power down.  That and the rules we used were so ill-defined that nobody really knew how the specifics worked (peeking at land, search effects, land types, etc).

That being said, my favorite card for the format was probably Sea Drake, since its CIP ability in Mental is pretty damn close to Gush.

[Hi-Val]

I mental a lot. Here are the observations I have made:

If you are playing with really good people, then you need to use draft leftovers. There's no such thing as a balanced Mental stack.

We use Legacy banned rules with Summer Bloom or Exploration only able to play out actual lands and Argothian Enchantress, Fact or Fiction and Songs of the Damned banned.

If you're playing with top-notch players, you need to ban the graveyard or else people will be able to combo out on the second or third turn. It's absolute sickness to watch but it gets old because there's the same game-start every time and if you don't know all the cyclers and dredgers, you absolutely lose.

[Anusien]

How do you handle facedown cards as lands?  Do they count as land types?

[andrewpate]

I don't play it a whole lot, but some guys at my store do it with draft leftovers pretty often.  The rules there are that the facedown lands count as every basic land type, so Allied Strategies gets played a LOT.

Also, something nobody else has mentioned, the rule is that you can use each card name only one time.  A common play is to use Fact or Fiction and then flashback as Deep Analysis (they have no B&R list), but you can't just hardcast Deep Analysis and then flashback.

[Jacob Orlove]

If you're playing with top-notch players, you need to ban the graveyard or else people will be able to combo out on the second or third turn. It's absolute sickness to watch but it gets old because there's the same game-start every time and if you don't know all the cyclers and dredgers, you absolutely lose.

See the mental magic discussion here: http://www.starcitygames.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=303371&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0

It starts about halfway down the first page, but only gets crazy on the second page, when Chapin presents a few basic combo games.

[JeremM]

If you're playing with top-notch players, you need to ban the graveyard or else people will be able to combo out on the second or third turn. It's absolute sickness to watch but it gets old because there's the same game-start every time and if you don't know all the cyclers and dredgers, you absolutely lose.

See the mental magic discussion here: http://www.starcitygames.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=303371&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0

It starts about halfway down the first page, but only gets crazy on the second page, when Chapin presents a few basic combo games.

Wow, thanks for that link!  I missed the article/thread the first time around (no interest in Nats), but it taught me three hugely important things about the format:

-Some actual, codified rules (whenever I played Mental before it often felt like rules were being made up on the spot)
-Some examples of combo finishes (although it seems like a quick Stabilizer/aggressive Leyline mulliganing would jam most of the combo kills dead?)
-How awful I am at Mental. 

[Hi-Val]

Well, it goes like turn 1 Rite of Flame, Book Burning you. You give me 6 cards, I kill you with those, otherwise I hit you with 4 more points of damage and kill you with Hidesugu's Second Rite. If you give me six cards, I cycle Lull the next turn into Life from the Loam or, G-d forbid, I cycle Disciple of Malice into Stinkweed Imp (or Barkhide Mauler into Gravetroll) and then cast the 2B as Reaping the Graves. If I have to, I pull it back with Grim Reminder. If you get 2, you drop Fluctuator and go until you dredge Swat into Necromantic Goo or whatever it is and then cast it as Haunting Misery for like 23 damage.

Or you just use 2B and accelerate into it with *anything* and demolish someone with Last Rites. You can recover from getting hit with that if you can discard stuff like 6G, Dodecapod, Mangara's Blessing, Psychic Allergy, etc., but don't really count on bouncing back from someone getting the madness advantage off Last Rites and then ending the game with it.

[Jacob Orlove]

Also, there are ways to remove Stabilizer from play for almost any cheap mana cost, many of which don't even cost a card. The best answers involve stopping spells that are on the stack, and winning before they can combo out.

[Hi-Val]

Storm cards are also really good, as should be expected. Ignite Memories will do scandalous damage and by turn 3-4, Temporal Fissure is a game win if you storm for 4 and just bounce their lands away.

[Hi-Val]

Oh yeah, I wanted to mention another reason for banning graveyards: Breakfast combo. It's really easy to assemble any En-Kor and a Cephalid Illusionist, and when you do, you increase your handsize by fifty or so. Put a Narcomoeba into play, then Dread Return whatever Vore you have in the graveyard to kill with. It's pretty unreal.

[Harlequin]

How we handle lands:

Playing "Prismatic Lands"

At any time you could play a land for your turn, you can put a card in your hand face down as a Prismatic Land.  Treat that land as the following:

[Prismatic Land
Land
~this~ is considered niether Basic nor Non-Basic.
T: Add one mana of any color to your mana pool.]

This land functionally answers "no" when asked "Are you basic?" as well as "Are you non-basic"  So it is uneffected by abilities that target only basics or non-basics alike.  However it is still counted as a land (so when asked "Are you a Land?" it will answer "yes").  Also it should be noted that it has no land type. 

This card cannot be "Turned Face Up" any ability that instructs you to do so, instead treats this as a card that is infact Face Up.  However, the controler may look at the face down card at any time.  (this may be relevant if you need to return a land to your hand).

If a Prismatic Land would go to a private Zone (hand, Library, RFGed facedown), OR INTO THE GRAVEYARD, it reverts back to the card printed text.  If it is removed from the game into a public RFG zone, then it REMAINS a land.  So Phaseing a Prismatic land out will not cause it to "flip."

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Other rules: 

- Vintage Ban List - with Black Lotus, Ancestral Recall, and Yawgmoth's Will banned. 

- The game is constantly under the effects of Shadow of Doubt "Players may not search the library."

- Double mana Symbols can be either mana symbol, but must be one mana symbol -
Izzet Guildmage can be any of the following: Mana Drain (UU), Fork (RR), or Razorfin Hunter (UR).  But not Shatter or Merchant scroll (1C).

* I like that rule because instead of running cards that are RR, or GG, I just run 1 of each guildmage + 1 extra UU because there is enough cool stuff at UU.

- Land Card - Land cards may be named as any land (includeing a basic land).  They do not have Card printed Cost 0, so they cannot be named as 0 mana cost artifacts.  However, Land Cards may be suspended as cards with {} casting cost, such as lotus bloom, ancestral visions or Wheel of Fate. 

- Artifact Land Cards - Artifact Lands from Mirrodin may be named as Any land card OR any artifact with Mana cost of 0.  Makeing artifact lands extremely powerful and versitle.

*combined we have 1 of each basic land, and 2 artifact lands. 

* As of right now, we divid up the one deck we have between the two players.  But If I ever get around to buying the Ravnica commons I need for the split-mana stuff ... I would ultimately like to build two identical decks.  I don't like working off the same library because

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- Cards in your graveyard can only be re-named when it is relevant and SELF SERVING.  So for example:  you cast Honor the Fallen which removes all creature cards (only) in any graveyard from the game.  I have a 2R Sorcery in my graveyard.  The sorcery is not a creature, therefor it is not normally effected by your card. At the begining of the turn, I can choose to make that card into a Squee and trigger the ability to return it to my hand (this is what is called self serving).  So a trigger goes on the stack, and the squee remains a squee as long as the the trigger is off the stack (resolved or countered).  After that the squee changes back into a 2R Sorcery.  Durring this time while the trigger is on the stack, the "Squee" WILL be by Honor the Fallen, becuase it is temporary a creature instead of a sorcery.  HOWEVER I cannot make the 2R into a squee for some other card.  If I cast animate dead, I CANNOT change my 2R sorcery into a squee (or any other creature).  I have to choose from an actual card-printed creature.  Once I choose my card-printed creature target, I can then make the chosen card into any new Named CREATURE Card I wish.  Mostly this makes logical sense, This rule is inplace so that cards like Replenish, or Songs of the Damned are not super-uber broken, and thus can be played with.  It also weakens cards like Animated Dead and it's kin.

Scenarios where this matters:
Trigger out of the graveyard - Death Spark, Squee, Ichorid, etc -
The card stays named as long as the ability is on the stack.  If the ability resolves, then the card stays named while it is in play.  So nameing Ichorid, removeing a creature and returning him to play will mean that the card will be in play as an Ichorid.  Also remember that when the card returns to the graveyard, it is no longer an Ichorid, and you CANNOT rename it to be an Ichorid because of the golden rule.

Activating abilities out of the graveyard - Ashen Goul.
See above.

Flashback
Playing a card with flashback MUST have a matching MANA COST.  So any card-printed 3U in your graveyard may be renamed as Deep Analysis, so long as you play it immediatly  (where a Card-printed 1U may NOT).  When you have priority to do so, rename the card into Deep analysis and then pay the Flashing back cost of 1U and 3 life, to put Deep Analysis on the stack. 

Dredge
Any card in your graveyard may be renamed as a card with dredge.  This decission is annouced when you would draw a card, simply rename a card in your graveyard into a dredge card, and complete the dredge replacement effect.  If for some reason the dredge card would not be "dredged" then it will revert to card-printed Text.

Gyofs.
Gyofs, Songs of the Damn, and other such counting cards only count cards that are -printed- of that type.  This gets a bit sticky, becuase in the above example with the squee changing into a squee while he is on the stack - songs of the damn will generate one more mana than it normally would.  The effect of this is minimal.

Special Rule: Incarnations
If you want to name a card in your graveyard an Incarnation you may do so at the begining of any turn.  The card will remain that incarnation until the end of the turn.  (Remember that the golden rule applies to incarnations, so essentially Wonder or Anger will only be in effect for 1 turn in any given game ... note that your prismatic lands do not count as islands or mountains so this only happens if you play a land as a basic).  Also because this is declared at the beginging of the turn, Genesis will still trigger... but only once per game.