Your Favorite Magic Card & Why (list no more than 3)

[msg67183]

Wurmcoil Engine. He's big, he's great and he has the sweetest Art.

[Marske]

1st: Necropotence.

It's seriously the hardest card to ever play "correct" (Do I draw to 7 or over do I draw more?, does my opponent have discard, how much life do I want to spend etc etc etc) The card single handly won (and lost) me more games in MTG then I care to remember, from "Old school" Necro (with Drain life's, Corrupts and Lake of the Dead) to Necro in TPS/Long/ANT.

2nd: Gifts Ungiven.
No other tutor spells: I don't care what you do but I win this game... when this resolves and the pilot knows what he's doing it's the most broken spell to possibly be played. Either in Extended / Modern grabbing solutions or tron pieces, or in Vintage grabbing combo pieces...

[xouman]

Hard call.

1-Nicol Bolas. Yes, the old nicol bolas. I started playing casual URB for years, and while unplayable, nicol bolas seemed so powerful.

2-Goblin welder. It does a lot, althought it looks like just 1 ability.

3-Earwig squad. 5/3 , removing 3 cards from a library, for just 2B? I cannot understand why it's not played... It was the center of the deck I started playing in vintage. I should create a deck around it again :p

[Bakalias]

Rings of Brighthearth
This card allowed me to play so much fun and interesting interactions.
This was the first card that I played competitively in Vintage that surprised my opponents. It allowed me some unexpected victory only due to the fact that my opponents didn't know it.
I remember at some tournaments, players that are since good friends of mine watching me playing and giggling when an opponent failed to see an infinity combo coming with the Rings.
Earing "He never played against you before, didn't he?" was always sweet to me!
I played a Shop Combo for several years and Rings still has a sweet spot in my heart. So much that I did my wedding invitations with it.

[Grand Inquisitor]

Brainstorm

I think purplehat's sig was either mis-remembered or someone retold the story inserting Chapin for me to give it more legs.  Right around the time Zherbus was blowing people out with skeletal scrying I said the exact.same.thing: "it's brainstorm...how can you not play brainstorm?  You've cast that card right?  and it resolved?"

Brainstorm enabled easy wins for some of the most ham-fisted card slingers, and it deserves its bad rap for hindering design innovation.  

Still, the properly timed brainstorm could be sublime.  It could seize victory from defeat, it could leverage knack and patience by a sophisticated pilot in a myriad of ways.  It is the player's coach version of Ancestral Recall.  In a world before competitive legacy, in a format of blue drawing things, it was pretty subtle and great for a while.

[Grand Inquisitor]

Nicol Bolas

...since I've been dabbling more in non-vintage formats, Nical Bolas, Planeswalker is a spot pick when I draft now.  Card is like the ultimate Timmy card and I love it.

[H]

Nicol Bolas

...since I've been dabbling more in non-vintage formats, Nical Bolas, Planeswalker is a spot pick when I draft now.  Card is like the ultimate Timmy card and I love it.

I played 5-color Planeswalkers back in Standard when Lorowyn and Alara were legal and I would always jam 1 of Bolas in the deck.  It almost never actually resolved, but when it did it is such a beating, it's much like Karn Liberated in that there is no way to kill it with creatures.

[serracollector]

Fact or fiction, gaes blessing, and jesters cap. i played a version of the deck with moat abyss and story circle based around those three mentioned above to just exile my opponents deck. such fun times. memories.

[worstbandnameever]

Moat - I admired the card when I was young but my interest in it came when I started playing Enchantress.  I love the artwork, the the name, and how well it ties into what it does.

Mageta the Lion - This was the first card I remember actively wanting to get a playset of when I was in high school.  A repeatable warth of god seemed like the best thing ever to me.  I don't think I ever use this card in any play, even casual, but I get excited whenever I see it.

Gaea's Cradle - When I was younger, I bought a ton of Urza's Saga packs.  I loved the symbol, the cards, the artwork, the lands form that set.  Cradle was one of the first cards I ever really remember opening and I think it has a fantastic look.  I rarely ever use cradles but I don't see me trading out of my playset at any point.

[rpf5029]

These are all fun to read.  Here are mine:

1)  Priest of Titania -- after I was taught to play Magic, my teacher would whoop me sideways with this gal, Intruder Alarm, and a bunch of other elves.  The unfair mana advantage it generates was amazing to me at the time, and I have been hooked on combo ever since.  Plus, the art is amazing -- especially blown up to its original size.

2)  Legacy Weapon -- This card, especially the Xth edition art, encapsulates everything I love about the flavor of the game.  

3)  Ancestral Recall -- This was my first piece of power (preceding the Lotus by about three days), and is the one I have that is in by far the best condition.  My favorite thing in all of Magic is to have more options, and there aren't many cards that are better at generating options than Ancestral Recall. It's also in my top three because it's always the card I'm happiest to cast in tournaments, and it also happens to the card that I play that tilts me most if it's stolen.  (By Notion Thief or Misdirection.)

EDIT:  That's the last time I try to type a lengthy post on my iPad.  :-\

[diopter]

Necropotence and Time Walk - two cards that you just gotta go "wtf were they thinking when they printed that??"

Necro is the most fun T1 play in vintage IMO.

[TheWhiteDragon]

Fave Vintage Card:  Goblin Welder  You're hard pressed to find a better effect on a critter for 1 mana.  He single handedly spawns a plethura of decks - Steel City, Redstax, slaver, etc.  I've loved this card since The Man Show.

Fave Legacy Card:  Dark Depths  I actually play Depths in Vintage as well, but he's great in Legacy too.  Anything that makes an indestructable, flying 20/20 is okay in my book.

Fave Modern Card: Phyrexian Obliterator  Hands down my favorite Modern Card.  He may actually be my favorite CARD - period.  4 mana for a 5/5 trample that reverse negators?  Yeah - sick.  I play BG in modern (with an all black producing mana-base) and this guy is a HOUSE.  He's won me 2 modern tourneys - Every one in which I ran this deck.

*These next two don't count as fave cards - just fave parts of cards*
Fave Flavor Text:  Starke of Rath  "I know to whom I owe the most loyalty, and I see him in the mirror every day."

Fave Art:  Soooo many good choices - incinerate (Ice age), Dance of the Dead, Annex....but I have to go with the fire monsters from shadowmoor - namely the Kulrath Knight

[LotusHead]

Mesmeric Orb. So much fun!

TimeTwister. So much fun!

Grand Architect. So much fun!

These are the pinnacle of my magic love.

(Keranos/Ral Zarek/Melek, Izzet paragon coming in distant 4th-6th)

[Twiedel]

#3 Rocket-Powered Turbo Slug - Wait, a slug who hast "Super Haste" and outraces Akroma and Kamahl in it's image ?? The most fun card for me, we even play it in our Type 4 Stack for big laughs. The greatest Un-Card in my view.

#2 Doomsday - I still remember finding out about this card a long time ago... getting my first Power pieces immediately got a huge boost, as I could not stand how very cool this card is. The definition of all-in for me, and almost impossible to loose when you resolve this card and don't make a mistake. We had a Vintage tournament on the day before brainstorm, merchant scroll, gush and ponder got the axe - I played 4 each + 4 Doomsday. Best tournament of my life, I think I lost only 2 sets that day and had the most fun ever doing broken stuff.

#1 Survival of the Fittest - Ever since I pulled this card from an Exodus Booster, I was in love with it. The most insane tutor engine in the game, and it basically meant excitement every year when great new effects were added in the form of comes-into-play creatures. Squee, Mystic Snake, Teferi, Sower of Temptation... Survival could do anything. Before it was banned from German Highlander, I played a Survival deck for years that never lost when I untapped with 3+ Mana and Survival in play unless I made a mistake. Love the art, love the flavour, best card ever.

[Albarkhane]

My three favorite cards in no special order :
- Goblin welder : you should read "T: bring a cup of coffee with sugar". I just can't manage to play shop without this card !
- Chains of pephistopheles : an unique card effect that challenges deck builders. I tried lots of deck with it, none were really competitive but all were very fun to play and so confusing for my opponents. I just love this card.
- Sinkhole : my first competitive deck in 1994 was a land-destroyer deck. cc2 instead of cc3 made so much a difference that i never lost a single game when i had it in my opening hand.

[MTGFan]

#1: Preeminent Captain. This is my favorite creature ever printed. He defines the concept of "aggro" for me, and forms the centerpiece of my favorite Legacy deck - Tomb Chalice Soldiers. There has never been a more aggressive creature printed. He's like a Goblin Lackey and a Goblin Warchief rolled into one, but for the Soldier tribe. There are few better feelings in this game than putting dudes into play for free AND attacking the turn they come into play.

#2: Back to Basics: This is a criminally underplayed card, mostly in Legacy, and amazing for its ability to completely punish greedy manabases. this was a house before fetchlands were printed, and is less powerful now, but still highly effective. I like how it just totally hoses the most popular strategy (playing multiple colors) while simultaneously rewarding a conservative mono-colored manabase. In this way it's the antithesis of modern Magic design.

#3: Glen-Elendra Archmage - Two Negates on a stick that can also attack and block. Somewhat of a steep mana investment but the ability to essentially counter two of your opponent's big spells with only one of your cards, and additionally do things like kill the opponent with that same card, is simply so cool and so effective.

[Bill Copes]

1:Juggernaut  It was the fatty in my first revised booster pack.  He smashed for five and could splash into any deck!  It often hit the board quickly via dark ritual or Llanowar elf.  When my mother bought me a workshop and some moxes for a birthday one year (back when they were less than $100 bills), I was then able to see the power of MOX, SHOP, JUGGERNAUT GO.

Flash forward to 2006. I'm attending a boat party, thrown by my at-the-time employer.  I meet a really hot lady and hit it off, but we get separated after a while.  I grab a beer, chill for a bit, and see her and some of the others congregating in the water; the topic of discussion, their favorite word.  It comes to the hot lady's turn, and she confidently says, "Juggernaut."  The people at this party were rich douchey types, and actually laughed at her for choosing such a silly word (one bitch didn't even know what it meant).  I couldn't tell you what the fuck their choices were, but I would assume they were sub-par, given their douchitude.  Anyhoo,  I hopped in the water, swam toward her, and told her that it was a wonderful word.  The evening progresses, things get heavy, phone numbers are exchanged . . .

And now she's my wife, happily married since 2010.

2:Lightning Bolt
So satisfying to resolve, and fun to make a, "zzzzzzt" sound upon doing so.  Kills all the cards and low-life players dead.

3:Uncle Istvan  I'm sure many creepy uncles play MTG, but only one is featured on its own card.

[Onslaught]

Some interesting replies, great thread idea. For me,

1. Gush

Turn three, no lands in hand, float UU, Gush. This feels so powerful, while at the same time being incredibly fun and full of options. The efficiency of a Gush deck will always epitomize the ruthless pressure of Vintage interactions, which is why I cherish the intensity of the format so much.

2. Night's Whisper

The art is bizarrely intriguing, the effect is crisp, and it creates an interesting contrast to Dark Confidant. The "inbetween" cards like this speak to the vast amount of options available in Vintage, and I appreciate when the fringe playables are incorporated in a deck to become more than the sum of their parts.

3. Lightning Bolt

It's so basic, but in a beautiful way. The art is simple but evocative, the effect is straightoforward, and the casting cost is clean. For one mana, it answers a more diverse array of threats than almost any other card. Bob, Jace, and Lodestone Golem are all sent packing by a bolt of lightning, and pointing it at your opponent's face is just gravy.

I went by things that are actually playable. Juzam and Braids will always mean the most to me from an art/flavor/mystique point of view, but I don't have as much fun with them since they sit in a binder.

[Klep]

My favorite card would have to be Counterspell.

My first starter had a lot of cards in it.  Reading the rule booklet introduced me to the basics of how the game works, and the Millstone I had as a rare showed me that the "lose if you can't draw" rule was more than just a failsafe, but an actual legitimate way to win the game.

But it wasn't until I got a Counterspell that I learned it was possible to say "No."  That not only was it possible for you to execute any number of strategies, but you could also stymie your opponents from executing theirs.  It dramatically increased the possibilities and complexities of the game, and I fell in love with control at that moment.

[ben_berry]

I'm going to second counterspell. I started with a bunch of hand me down revised/unlimited and put together a mono green spraloking deck. Looking back it was bad but not horrible for the "meta." Until the guy who gave the cards pulled out a sea singer.

A while later I bought a started deck of 4th I think and in it was a counterspell. "Wait, you can do that."  Why didn't anyone tell me you can do that?

[JPoJohnson]

You two talking about Counterspell reminds me of when I first started playing I would try to counter non-basic lands (since I knew basic lands weren't spell, but non-basics were just too powerful to not be a spell!) Also trying to Counter the creature put into play with Show N' Tell instead of Show N' Tell itself because... I wanted free creatures but you shouldn't have them! 

[nedleeds]

#3) Nether Void. The futility of trying to play every variant of mana denial, or aggro and getting everything and all the progress you'd made get wiped out for 1W was infuriating. Things got so dire in the Spring of 1994, I would play maindeck Gloom sometimes. Nether Void changed everything because it with the first global mana denial, it allowed you to fundamentally wind the game back 3 turns and build a deck that could operate under those constraints.



#2) Black Knight. My first starter had a Scrubland, a Black Knight and a Swords to Plowshares. Black Knight for me defines black as a color in magic, the art is fantastic, the card is so well designed, it has a nemesis in White Knight, and the flavor text is boss.



#1) Juzam Djinn. I arrived at my first event ~January 1994 (75 card B/W pile in tow) with black knights, hypnotic spectres, my 2 prized sengir vampires and serra angels, a veteran bodyguard just in case. Other than the 4 sol rings I was told would be an issue ...  I was ready to roll. I had crushed my local playgroup that winter, nobody could beat Sengir/Serra -> Armageddon when I had 2 or 3 sol rings out. I played a guy in that tourney who went Mox, Land, Ritual Juzam. I stared at this thing. I couldn't comprehend how a creature like this could exist. It was cheaper than my angels and vampires but it was bigger. The art was just ... insane. I was the dude being held. The djinn had a huge grin on his face because he knew his owner was about to crush me. That day I scoured the store trying to get some of these arab cards I'd never seen. I managed to trade for 2, I'd later buy 2 more in a diner and my set was complete. Think about Juzam ... it's effectively useless. In every format. It's still $100+. It's that iconic. The art is that much stronger than all.

[vaughnbros]

1. Battle of Wits.  Almost every deck plays 60 cards, and those who go to 61 are usually frowned upon.  Battle of wits is card that makes you play 200+ in your deck, over 3 times the amount most players would find acceptable.  I just find it awesome that you can forgo a major tradition in magic deck building, playing the minimum 60 cards, and do as well as these decks do.

2. Bazaar of Baghdad.  Bazaar is a card that when built around makes your graveyard, not your hand, your most important resource for card advantage.  Its what makes dredge, a deck capable of winning by casting 0 spells, possible.  In this fashion this card allows you to fight against another major convention of the game, that you must cast a spell in order to win.

3.  Goblin Game.  Ok, maybe not as powerful as the other two I mentioned, but I mean come on this card should obviously have a silver border.  Is there anything else even remotely like it thats tournament legal?
i.  What are defined as objects?  A pack of sleeves?  Each individual sleeve? A single dice?  I mean they have a judge ruling on this part of it, but what happens if we don't clearly define how many objects we are hiding?
ii.  What is considered hiding it?  Is putting it behind my back good enough?  Do I need to shove it down my pants? Do previously hidden objects count?  
iii.  Can I only hide objects that I personally own?  It seems like there might be some legal issues if not.

Even after the wall of text on the card there is still so much room for interpretation.  I kind of want to play this in a real tournament, and call the judge over every time after it resolves and argue how I thought it should've resolved differently just to give the judge a headache.

[RitNecroWin]

3.  Goblin Game.  

Even after the wall of text on the card there is still so much room for interpretation.  I kind of want to play this in a real tournament, and call the judge over every time after it resolves and argue how I thought it should've resolved differently just to give the judge a headache.

Obviously near and dear to my heart...

I have contemplated this time and time again... but how the hell do you ever get the mana and resolve this thing LOL. It 100% should have a silver border!

[nedleeds]

Steamflogger Boss also falls in the silver bordered realm ...

[vaughnbros]

Steamflogger Boss also falls in the silver bordered realm ...

Nah I'm still holding out for the day they print a rigger that can assemble a contraption.

Side note:  If you have 2 steamflogger bosses they turn eachother into 4/3 hasters!  His buff also works on changelings.

[NosferatuStuff]

#1. Ornithopter.  When that came out I was amazed at infinite combo ever since, it was a creature for  OMG!

#2. Wheel of Fortune.  Just seemed so crazy, cards flying everywhere.  Who was going to get the best deal out of the 7 random new cards. 

#3. Black Vise.  I must have won more games with this card that anything else ever.  Plus it was in my first pack ever opened.  Love me some doll crushing!

[evil-rage]

1) Jace, The Mind Sculptor. At the time, I was into buying boxes to feed my standard habit (should have been buying singles/playsets, tsk tsk), and I bought a case of WWK. I opened 3 Jaces in those boxes, and then played a limited tourney a week or so after release, IIRC. I went 3-1, made the cut to top 8, and my final round opponent (after making it to the finals) offered to split. I don't remember if I declined and beat him, or if we split unevenly. Either way, I won about 10 or so WWK packs, and one of them contained my 4th Jace. It was magical.

2) Time Vault. I picked up an unlimited version on ebay a few years back that was sealed in a BGS case (BGS 9.5, actually). I had opened a couple of PSA cases for my Mana Drains, so I figured no big deal. Big mistake. Got the TV and that plastic was THICK as hell. So I did what any sensible player would do. I drilled about a dozen holes in the top of the case, above the card - enough to weaken it structurally. I used some pliers to crack the top off, then ever so carefully slid the vault out. And then I sleeved it and took lots of extra turns.

3) Lightning Bolt. Specifically, the foil MPR lightning bolt. Art by Veronique Meignaud, my favorite artist for the full-art Zendikar lands. I bought about 100 of them when they first came out. I traded half of them in recently, at buylist, and didn't lose value, so that's cool I guess, though I should learn to sell on ebay or something. Anyway, I just love her art, and I'd love to find a lithograph or something of that card so I can put it somewhere in my house.

[nedleeds]

Steamflogger Boss also falls in the silver bordered realm ...

Nah I'm still holding out for the day they print a rigger that can assemble a contraption.

Side note:  If you have 2 steamflogger bosses they turn eachother into 4/3 hasters!  His buff also works on changelings.

You shamefully forgot the only other rigger. Moriok Rigger. #GETSOME

[vaughnbros]

Steamflogger Boss also falls in the silver bordered realm ...

Nah I'm still holding out for the day they print a rigger that can assemble a contraption.

Side note:  If you have 2 steamflogger bosses they turn eachother into 4/3 hasters!  His buff also works on changelings.

You shamefully forgot the only other rigger. Moriok Rigger. #GETSOME

Damn you got me!  There's going to so much synergy between those riggers though.  Clearly the contraptions are going to be artifacts with some sort of sacrifice ability.