Sets Battle for Zendikar Spoilers

RavebornMuse

RavebornMuse

blacksmithy said:
Time for another misplaced Fight Club post!
Can we compare/contrast Endless One with Chronomaton and Hangarback Walker?
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Chronomaton
- grows slowly
- supports artifact matters

Hangarback Walker
- really cool
- really good
- supports artifact matters
- expensive

Endless One
- boring
- not exciting at all
- not an artifact
- total crap
- helps reduce cube size by counting as an undraftable piece of filler
- poop
- poo poo
- stinky poopie poop
- CRAAAAAP
 
Grillo_Parlante

Grillo_Parlante

Contributor
Basically all that endless one does is pitch to force. If you are not running force of will stay away, but if you are there are probably much better blue cards you could be running, which do more than just pitch to force.

Like hangerback walker for instance.
 
B

blacksmithy

Hmm. I want to run tentacle monsters in my Cube, but WOTC won't print any good ones. What do? Obviously it's time to retreat to the Custom Cards thread.

EDIT: Nvm I don't wanna double post in there again so here we go:

Endless One that at least makes a half-assed attempt to be cubable and on-flavor {X}
Creature—Eldrazi
Endless One enters the battlefield with X +1/+1 counters on it.
When Endless One leaves the battlefield, choose one:
• Distribute its +1/+1 counters among any number of target creatures.
• Put X 1/1 Eldrazi Scion tokens on the battlefield, where X is the number of +1/+1 counters on Endless One. They have "Sacrifice this creature: Add {1} to your mana pool."
0/0
 
Goldenpineapple

Goldenpineapple

134.jpg
 
ahadabans

ahadabans

The only thing that intrigues me about Endless One is the fact that it can go in any deck at any CC. So it's not just filler, it's like the ultimate filler card.

Not sure how drafts go with you groups, but suboptimal deck lists happen often enough to where I can see guys grabbing this to plug a hole somewhere in their decks. And it will show up in a game and be whatever drop you need it to be and wind up being very playable. It's definitely boring. It's also probably below curve in even my lower powered cube. But it's flexible and in cube that is worth much more in practice than on paper.

As boring as commands and charms are, I keep adding more of them to cube because of the positive impact they have on games. No one drafts Dimir Charm and thinks (man, this card is AMAZING). They draft it because they are UB and it wheels and they figure "why not? I need another 2 drop". And then they draw it in the game and have a much greater appreciation for the fact that it does something almost all the time.

We typically theorycraft ideal scenarios (magical X-mas land), but that isn't how most games play out. You draw removal and your opponent has no targets. Or you draw a creature but don't have the double mana to cast it. Or you have this great card that can bash face but no way to get it through a wall you opponent played. Long story less long... you often have effectively dead cards in hand depending on the matchup or board state. Flexible cards (while not being super powerful) are very rarely dead. And that is what makes them so playable.

Is Endless One a card like that? It might be. If you need a curve filler, this guy does that. Need a body to hold some equipment? Sure thing. He does that for 1. You need a 4/4 to break a stall, he can do that too. Ramp deck fatty? OK. Pay 10 mana and you get a 10/10.

I don't know. I think this is pretty playable honestly. And not every card has to be super complex and mechanic heavy does it?
 
Grillo_Parlante

Grillo_Parlante

Contributor
Aston said:
Is there a joke here that I'm not getting?
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In vintage and legacy, its not uncommon for people to rationalize cards that should not be in their deck, on the basis that it "also pitches to force."

On riptide, we will rationalize running some very marginal cards, if it "also works with +1 +1 counters"

Not that there is anything really wrong with this, just that its become a funny cultural hubris of the forum, and this card is a perfect embodiement of an anemic counters card that would generate undeserved excitment, purely on the basis of a very low bar: the fact that it involves counters in some way.
 
RavebornMuse

RavebornMuse

I've never found commands or charms to be boring. I like versatility.

That said: "the ultimate filler" is still not worth cubing. Because filler is bad. If Endless One proves draftable and routinely makes the cut for your drafters, it's indicative of a bad cube or bad drafters. If your cube is bad, you need to work on putting in more playables and fiddling with the curve. If your drafters are bad, you need to let them fuck up until they get good. But you don't use barbed wire just because you're out of dental floss; you get dental floss, or you don't, and that's your own fault. Enjoy your gingivitus, nerd! But anyway, that's always been my policy. You want a rich format with lots of cool things going on? Skip the efficient vanilla creatures that have little play to them, because at the end of the day, so what, who cares?
 
FlowerSunRain

FlowerSunRain

Contributor
Skyrider Elf is awesome. Not only is he a strong, versatile card that pitches to force, he also pitches to force! Endless One is nice to take some sharp edges off your cube, but there are other ways to do it that might be more interesting and if you want sharp edges stay away.
 
safra

safra

Grillo_Parlante said:
In vintage and legacy, its not uncommon for people to rationalize cards that should not be in their deck, on the basis that it "also pitches to force."

On riptide, we will rationalize running some very marginal cards, if it "also works with +1 +1 counters"

Not that there is anything really wrong with this, just that its become a funny cultural hubris of the forum, and this card is a perfect embodiement of an anemic counters card that would generate undeserved excitment, purely on the basis of a very low bar: the fact that it involves counters in some way.
Click to expand...

i ran detention sphere over council's judgment for months under just this rationalization since i really needed enough blue cards to run 4x Forces maindeck (d.sphere got abrupt decayed like every game)
 
Onderzeeboot

Onderzeeboot

Ecstatic Orb
RavebornMuse said:
I've never found commands or charms to be boring. I like versatility.

That said: "the ultimate filler" is still not worth cubing. Because filler is bad. If Endless One proves draftable and routinely makes the cut for your drafters, it's indicative of a bad cube or bad drafters. If your cube is bad, you need to work on putting in more playables and fiddling with the curve. If your drafters are bad, you need to let them fuck up until they get good. But you don't use barbed wire just because you're out of dental floss; you get dental floss, or you don't, and that's your own fault. Enjoy your gingivitus, nerd! But anyway, that's always been my policy. You want a rich format with lots of cool things going on? Skip the efficient vanilla creatures that have little play to them, because at the end of the day, so what, who cares?
Click to expand...
I think this attitude leads to a bad cube. Cards that read bad have been way better in practice before (Tarmogoyf being the most famous example, but as recently as Origins, few were giving Hangarback Walker much credit). I like that this card is a cheap blocker if you need one, but a big beatstick if you topdeck it late. To me it looks like a flexible drop that is always on curve. It's not exiting because the body is good for its cost, it's exiting because the body is decent at any cost (well, not at {1}, okay). I don't see a boring card, I see a clean design.
 
Grillo_Parlante

Grillo_Parlante

Contributor
Onderzeeboot said:
I think this attitude leads to a bad cube. Cards that read bad have been way better in practice before (Tarmogoyf being the most famous example, but as recently as Origins, few were giving Hangarback Walker much credit). I like that this card is a cheap blocker if you need one, but a big beatstick if you topdeck it late. To me it looks like a flexible drop that is always on curve. It's not exiting because the body is good for its cost, it's exiting because the body is decent at any cost (well, not at {1}, okay). I don't see a boring card, I see a clean design.
Click to expand...

....and it also pitches to force.

Ok, ok i'm done, exiting stage left.
 
ahadabans

ahadabans

RavebornMuse said:
If your drafters are bad, you need to let them fuck up until they get good.
Click to expand...


Only wanted to comment on this part specifically. Not all groups have the same mindset. I game with a couple ex-Magic players and a bunch of others who thinks it's a fun diversion but nothing more.

While I can appreciate what you are saying here, if I were to go full tough love on my playgroup they would just opt to do something else on game night. No one is interested in Magic bootcamp or super competitive gaming (hence why we gravitate towards multiplayer in Magic and co-op style games like D&D).

Bottom line, guys don't take this game super serious. And while I want to reward those that put the energy into unlocking some of the "tech" I build into my cube, I also don't want Joe-lazy winding up not having fun because he can't draft a playable (but not top tier - that is important) goodstuff deck.

A card like Endless One will appeal to the weaker and/or lazier drafters while not being a key card in making a draft winning goodstuff deck. Seems like a win to me at least in my environment. And it does have the benefit of "pitching to force Riptide style". So there's that too.

The more I defend this card, the more I want to try it to see if I'm just talking out of my ass.
 
Alfonzo Bonzo

Alfonzo Bonzo

I know it's colourless but wildcall isn't exactly setting cube on fire. (But I'm playing it).

There is an interesting tension on how long you should hold out playing it for. Probably some odd interactions like ranger of eos that might be relevant. I admit I was underwhelmed when I first saw it but it might be okay.
 
Aston

Aston

Grillo_Parlante said:
In vintage and legacy, its not uncommon for people to rationalize cards that should not be in their deck, on the basis that it "also pitches to force."

On riptide, we will rationalize running some very marginal cards, if it "also works with +1 +1 counters"

Not that there is anything really wrong with this, just that its become a funny cultural hubris of the forum, and this card is a perfect embodiement of an anemic counters card that would generate undeserved excitment, purely on the basis of a very low bar: the fact that it involves counters in some way.
Click to expand...

Oooooh, I was trying to figure out why everyone thought it was blue!
 
Goldenpineapple

Goldenpineapple

I think it's fine. It's really boring and plays really badly with a lot of in-place mechanics (reanimating, casting for free/putting into play etc) but it's just of a card you wouldn't really be all that ashamed to run. If you make painstaking cuts every time you draft, this card is probably bad, but if people sometimes come up short on the threat spectrum it's an ok safety net.
Here are some cards:
sanctumofugin.jpg
duststalker.jpg

Cards you have to recast aren't exactly fantastic, and sadly sanctum's trigger is probably too niche even for most ULDs- how many 7+CMC colorless spells do people run, two? Three?
 
RavebornMuse

RavebornMuse

Jason Waddell said:
Can we address this "filler is bad" mentality? I'm not sure that I agree. What are we defining as filler and what are we defining as bad?
Click to expand...

I think we're about to get into a definitional war similar to the "tempo" debate that will derail this thread and offer little value, but since I stirred the pot, let me be the first to really address it.

Filler is there. Filler is here. Filler is now, and filler is you and me. Anything is filler depending on your angle. Doom Blade might be called "filler removal" because it doesn't serve any purpose but to box-check cube removal counts. Savannah Lions might be called "white aggro filler" for a similar reason. Same with Disenchant or perhaps Boros Signet. Somebody will disagree with all of those assessments and won't be wrong or right for it. So, recognize from the start: filler has a lot of meanings and isn't a useful term until contextualized.

I'm not blindly opposed to all filler. I think a degree of filler is necessary. I run some cards that, while likeable, are arguably just filler.

My issue with filler is when it feels "bad". I don't like "bad filler". Bad filler to me is a large colourless creature section to allow decks to soak up bodies. Bad filler to me is lots of colourless removal so any colour can go control. It is not necessarily wrong, or bad, or unplayable, but for me, philosophically, it is undesirable. I draft primarily with one other very skilled drafter and one of a handful of (a growing number of) friends, so I can afford the luxury of being more demanding, because so are my drafters. We are not Spikes; we are impatient Johnnies and Timmies who despise casting things that are simply vanilla creatures. It just doesn't interest us. So bad filler to me = vanilla creatures and too much colourless stuff just to fill gaps.

More specifically, my issue with filler is when it's stuff almost anyone can get use out of that is virtually always the least desirable option if you had the choice. Stuff in my cube previously that I considered filler was Steel Hellkite; an efficient, colourless creature anyone could draft as a closer without having to really try, because it was colourless and somewhat inferior to most options in-colour. I am opposed to this sort of "dregs of the draft" filler that will only be picked up at the bottom of a pack by most players outside of a dire need for its effect, because it isn't exciting. My playgroup has fun building decks that reward clever crafting, while also playing in a format that is powerful enough to allow even the most tuned decks real competition from those that didn't totally get there. If people oppose this philosophy, that's fine, but I'm well aware that filler is something we arguably all use; it's a matter of definitions, though, and I think by the end of it we'll all be splitting hairs unproductively.

tl;dr - I don't like Endless One because it bores me and my playgroup doesn't like boring-but-playables. YPMV and if it does, go nuts!
 
Chris Taylor

Chris Taylor

Contributor
RavebornMuse said:
And IDC if it's UW I am totally gonna run Noyan Dar. Spells-matter UW support, woo!
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I kinda prefer Talrand, since he's not capped on army size and the army he makes is evasive, but you do you.

Also:
horriblyawry.jpg

Ooooooo! Well, I wanted blue to have a pillar of flame variant and dissipate wasn't that great when I tried it... I'll give it a shot!
FSR: You're the other guy here I can recall having the obscenely low curve. Is this too good?

spawningbed.jpg

I could swear this was a card from fallen empires...
interesting. Activating it basically costs 7, since you need 6 other lands, which kinda puts it out of range for "just for value" land slots for me, since you need to put a lot of work in to reach 7. On the other hand, lands being hordeling outburst is a nice upside.
 
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