Saturday, March 25, 2017

UG Modern Vehicles

This is a learning deck. It plays well, and it has artifacts I need for the deck that I am not normally going to attack with anyways, and are therefore great to crew vehicles.




Here is a game I won against a casual Exalted deck. I was able to crew Fleetwheel Cruiser while I help attacks back with Etched Champion (a true artifact creature all star).


Here is a game I won against a Red Green aggro deck. My opponent gave up with a played my Wurmcoil Engine.


Vehicles are the reason why I am not excited about Kaladesh block even though artifact blocks are my favorite. Sometimes doing something new means doing something boring.

Modern Masters 2017 MTGO Buy List

These are the cards I am interested in getting. I am passing on Liliana of the Veil and Tarmogoyf.


April 1, 2017 update: I got all the cards I was missing that are now less than a quarter each online.






April 4, 2017 Update: I got a few of the low-hanging fruit.


I doubt I will get anymore of these cards, the list below is more of a wish list in case prizes go down. This set is not being drafted online long enough and often enough for these prices to go down much further. I think I am done, except if for some reason some of these cards go down in price a little more.


Wednesday, March 22, 2017

Vintage Vehicles Try-out

OK, I guess I will play with these a little. I am not a fan of tapping for anything, and it's the reason why I thought Cohort was a terrible ability. But as a true Johnny deckbuilder, I like to play with all the cards, even the ones that don't appeal to me. (Solitaire, of course, there's near zero Vintage play online, and almost absolutely zero casual Vintage play)





Vehicles require you to have creatures you have no need for, except for tapping them to attack with vehicles. That is inherently a sucky strategy. Now you are using two cards to get something out of one of them. Yes, the vehicles are good attackers once crewed, but not that great.


Why would I want to tap my Wurmcoil Engine?


Vehicles don't enable other artifacts or other anything. They are only a resource sink.


I certainly plan to use Bomat Bazaar in battlecruiser Standard. It draws me a card!


Crackdown Construct is solid. It gets buffed every time I crew a vehicle.


Here is another example of Crackdown Construct getting buffed.


Here I am using Merchant's Dockhand to Scry 4. It is one very costly Scry 4, yet it is a Scry 4.


Oh, I get to buff Crackdown Construct. Not bad!


I get JTMS with my Scry 4.


With Daredevil Dragster I can attack twice, sacrifice it, and draw two cards.


Untethered Express is great. If I can play it well, it gets +1/+1 every time I successfully attack with it.


Here is the trigger for another counter.


In conclusion, I don't see why I would want to play vehicles in any other format than Standard. I feel that this is a missed opportunity for these cards.

Next day update: but I am not being true to my nature as a Johnny Deckbuilder. I DO want to try vehicles in other formats. I got me these now that they have fallen off standard (Smuggler's Copter is banned in Standard).


Tuesday, March 21, 2017

Standard Naya Investigate

Yes, I know, another Investigate deck.




I played against a deck similar to this one, only it was missing White.


I had all the flyers and my opponent was not able to build an overwhelming army.


I played two games against a Herald of Anguish deck. I lost the first game and won the second one.


The deck sacrifices artifacts to trigger Pia's Revolution.


I hope Herald of Anguish goes down in price. I want to play this card.


This deck is likely not running a playset of Herald of Anguish because it is using Merchant's Dockhand to Scry for it.


For the second game I drew the correct cards. Variance was in my favor. Here I get rid of Pia's Revolution.


Later, I take out Hearld of Anguish as soon as it lands on the board. I don't want to be discarding any cards from my hand!


I had the win after removing those two pieces.


Near the end of this game, my opponent cast Lifecraft Awakening to boost a token.


Here is the token.


The deck also uses Crackdown Construct.


Standard Jund Artifacts

It looks like Amonkhet will be a Shard block. If it is, the current Standard has great tools to support the Shards.




I played a fun game in which I had, at a later stage, an entire playset of Lifecrafter's Bestiary. I almost milled myself! At this point, I only have two of them on the board.


My opponent has two strong flyers on the board and have one Ruinous Path dedicated to each.




I now have three Lifecrafter's Bestiary on the board.


I am drawing three extra cards every time I cast a creature. Nice!


First removal.


Voldaren Pariah transforms...


And that is going to suck for me.


I am left with one creature and I go for my second removal.


My opponent does not have enough creatures to replace the ones I just removed.