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- Thread starter James Stevenson
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I personally like Wildfire, but it's a brutal effect and so probably not a good fit in lower power environments. Reality is I probably shouldn't be running it anymore.
Power maxers generally pair it with Upheaval, and this strategy obviously goes well with mana rocks and fat things that live through Wildfire. Pairs nicely with green ramp too (the land based kind of ramp). Mwonvuli Acid-Moss into Wildfire timed correctly is basically unrecoverable. It can also be considered non-interactive and un-fun too, so proceed with caution.
Power maxers generally pair it with Upheaval, and this strategy obviously goes well with mana rocks and fat things that live through Wildfire. Pairs nicely with green ramp too (the land based kind of ramp). Mwonvuli Acid-Moss into Wildfire timed correctly is basically unrecoverable. It can also be considered non-interactive and un-fun too, so proceed with caution.
I found that Wildfire was too much work for not enough payoff - if you're building your list with the density of survivors you need to make drafting the deck viable, there's a real danger that your opponent has something that survives too, so now your emergency reset card doesn't even take out their big threat. I like the red artifact mana thing, I like symmetrical effects, but Wildfire (especially two copies) never came together as a real winning deck, and it takes so many slots to include that I decided it wasn't worth it. It really shines in powered lists where you can slam it as an Armageddon thanks to fast mana, and just gets clunkier the less powerful you go.
I get a similar effect out of Cataclysm and Tragic Arrogance, which encourage having a more type-diverse board (or deck) than the other player, which is easier to draft and much less 'poisonous', but if you want a massive combo turn you might be able to get away with Greater Gargadon and Planar Cleansing.
I really liked GR Wildfire in Modern Masters 2 - it was one of the few things I enjoyed in that format, as it was a perfect balance of a powerful effect that requires a fair bit of setup there. It's funny, Wildfire seems to work in high powered environments, and low-powered retail limited formats, but not in middle ground Riptide environments...?
Chris Taylor
Contributor
Oh man nobody's linked my primer yet:
http://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/primer-wildfire.87/
It's a bit old, but the fundamentals are there.
http://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/primer-wildfire.87/
It's a bit old, but the fundamentals are there.
It's worth noting that in MM2 Wildfire kills almost every nonrare creature and every common creature (I think), which might make it particularly good.
That's just two commons that I remember off the top of my head.
I mean, you can just kill everything, sure, at which point it's an overcosted Wrath. Is the point of Wildfire not to leave something behind for yourself, though...? You don't really hear anyone talking about a Planar Cleansing archetype, despite it showing up in several core set limited formats.
edit: here are the ones i forgot about at common
To be clear, what I'm saying is that there's a Wildfire archetype that's available to drafters in Modern Masters 2, which isn't normally the case with Generic Board Sweepers. There wasn't a Crux of Fate archetype in Fate Reforged, nor was there an End Hostilities archetype in Khans of Tarkir. Your point about power level strikes me as strange - I have to call you out here and ask if you've even drafted the format before - because sweepers being good is a known quantity, but the fact that Wildfire is good is almost besides the point. Grave Titan was certainly good in M11 and M12, too!
Putting power level considerations aside, the crux of the point is that the Wildfire archetype is both well-supported and fun to play in Modern Masters 2. As I alluded to in my post above, it's a mental puzzle to both try and position yourself to get to your big creature out as soon as possible, while figuring out how to deal with their large threats that survive the sweeper. Sometimes you hold back the Wildfire for too long, while doing the mental gymnastics, and get punished; other times, you blow it too early, before you've put together an optimal on-board configuration. Most of all, I was impressed that a) Wildfire was supported without the plethora of mana rocks that usually accompanies its success, and b) it had an uncommon back-up plan in Savage Twister, ensuring that you could draft the deck without needing to open a specific rare.
All that's to say is that I'm not giving up on Wildfire in cube, even though I agree with every word of safra's post. The fact that there's a working - and fun! - Wildfire archetype in a retail limited format gives me hope that there's a cube power level out there somewhere where this is possible.
Putting power level considerations aside, the crux of the point is that the Wildfire archetype is both well-supported and fun to play in Modern Masters 2. As I alluded to in my post above, it's a mental puzzle to both try and position yourself to get to your big creature out as soon as possible, while figuring out how to deal with their large threats that survive the sweeper. Sometimes you hold back the Wildfire for too long, while doing the mental gymnastics, and get punished; other times, you blow it too early, before you've put together an optimal on-board configuration. Most of all, I was impressed that a) Wildfire was supported without the plethora of mana rocks that usually accompanies its success, and b) it had an uncommon back-up plan in Savage Twister, ensuring that you could draft the deck without needing to open a specific rare.
All that's to say is that I'm not giving up on Wildfire in cube, even though I agree with every word of safra's post. The fact that there's a working - and fun! - Wildfire archetype in a retail limited format gives me hope that there's a cube power level out there somewhere where this is possible.
Grillo_Parlante
Contributor
Was that a bounceland powered deck? I know that seems strange to ask, but savage twister is very much a sweeper that becomes grossly better with bouncelands.
Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
Are you saying I should add bounce lands to my cube, despite how bad they are for Aggro?
That's just two commons that I remember off the top of my head.
I mean, you can just kill everything, sure, at which point it's an overcosted Wrath. Is the point of Wildfire not to leave something behind for yourself, though...? You don't really hear anyone talking about a Planar Cleansing archetype, despite it showing up in several core set limited formats.
edit: here are the ones i forgot about at common
Oh, there were quite a few I'd forgotten about. Perhaps what I was thinking was it kills every common creature except for a few that you have to jump through hoops to get - I think of those you pointed out, only Gorehorn Minotaurs would be a 5/5 on turn 6 or 7 when you cast Wildfire, followed by Skyreach Manta. Depending on the deck, Rusted Relic might get turned off by it, depending on how many creature vs non-creature artifacts you have. I also think including Matca Rioters here is a bit disingenuous.
I guess I'm trying to say is there there's only like one creature at common with toughness of 5+, and that costs 8 mana. Even at uncommon the only creatures that naturally survive are Pelakka Wurm and Artisan of Kozilek at 7 and 10 mana, and like Water Servant and Restless Apparition can pump to escape it and Algae Gharial and Scavenger Drake can grow out of range.
So really perhaps what you need for Wildfire to be particularly good is a format where 4 toughness is a particular breaking point which is designed around, so that you can draft Wildfires and then prioritise the few creatures that survive it?
There was a weird tension when drafting and building the GR ramp archetype, because the deck wants bouncelands to generate as much mana as it can get, while also requiring basic lands for the domain cards like Tribal Flames and Matca Rioters. Since you have to jam a couple of basics you don't really want, that leaves room for only one or two bouncelands, possibly three if you're pushing it. I will say that sunburst cards like Etched Oracle and Skyreach Manta perform much better in the deck, because they're a natural reward for bouncelands producing a random splash colour.
Hmmmm. This is a hard post to respond to, because it's a) strangely reductive and tries to boil down the entire format into a couple of pithy statements of arguable merit, and b) makes broad generalizations about the frequency at which certain events occur in the format, while ignoring the subtleties and synergies baked into the environment.
Again, I hate to put you on the spot, but my gut instinct tells me to ask the question again: have you drafted the format? Or merely read a couple of articles and looked at the spoilers list? I ask because your conclusions about the format are odd, and playing just a few rounds - with any deck, against any deck - would lead you to a different set of observations.
In no particular order, here's why all of the above creatures matter:
- Gorehorn Minotaurs is red, to be sure, but if it's made its way into your GR ramp deck, something has gone horribly awry. As one of the slowest decks in the format, it's unlikely you'll be able to turn on bloodthirst when you need it, as your deck isn't looking to get in for 2 in the early going. Rather, it's your BR opponents' that'll be charging in with 5/5's on turn four that you'll need to worry about.
- With Darksteel Citadel at common, along with various other trinkets, baubles, and equipment, it's actually trivially easy to activate Rusted Relic, much moreso than in Scars of Mirrodin limited. Keep in mind that even if you manage to turn it off temporarily by sweeping their smaller artifact creatures, it's usually not difficult for the pilot to draw a cheap artifact or two afterwards and switch the lights back on. I'd go so far as to say that affinity is the hardest matchup for a GR ramp deck, because of Rusted Relic alone.
- Let's talk about Moonlit Strider, because this guy is a nightmare and a half. Often, how the sequences goes is:
-- Cast red damage-based sweeper.
-- In response, they sac Strider to grant protection from red to their best guy.
-- Soulshift triggers, they return Nameless Inversion to their hand.
-- They cast Inversion on your guy who was supposed to survive the sweeper.
-- When the dust settles, they have their best guy, and you don't. If it was Wildfire, you're also in tough to catch up.
With Strider, it's less about his toughness and more about the spirit synergies prevalent and available in the environment.
- Ulamog's Crusher is something of a red herring, because the GR deck often can't wait until it hits eight mana to cast its sweeper; it usually needs to clear out the riff raff before then, or risk succumbing to any number of shenanigans.
- I completely agree that Matca Rioters might not be the most legitimate suggestion. But is including it any worse than a snarky comment about Wildfire killing all commons, when that isn't remotely close to true?
Part of the fun of Wildfire and its cousins was navigating the tricky maze of your opponent's large bodies - of which there were plenty in the format, despite what a cursory Gatherer search might tell you - while trying to land a credible threat yourself. As I mentioned earlier, I don't think Wildfire is as good in the environment as you're making it out to be, and that's exactly why it was fun. To be sure, it's a powerful effect, but one that requires plenty of legwork on your part to get maximum - or sometimes, any! - value out of it.
To bring the discussion around full circle, I think what makes Wildfire work in Modern Masters 2 is less about "four toughness matters" - though that certainly plays a role - and more that ramp is a supported theme. Sometimes you need the pull the trigger on Wildfire even when you aren't ahead on board, but hopefully you've amassed that many more lands than your opponent to put Stage Two of the game slightly in your favour. In the context of cube: if non-creature-based green ramp is something that you're enabling, Wildfire feels like it could be one of the primary reasons to go into GR ramp specifically, as it provides a unique reward that's different from - but works alongside with - giant monsters.
I love the gist of your first sentence: "[cardname] isn't as good in this particular environment and that's why it is fun". Below the power-max bands, this is a great target for cube designers. I don't Wildfire to come out on turn 4, like with Budde's Standard deck, annihilating my opponent's resources and leaving me with a few threats. I want it to happen turn 5-6 and leave me in a slightly advantageous spot. But I want to lose some games when I resolve it (due to my opponent playing smart in the moment or planning better).
Disclaimer: Ember Swallower loves Wildfire. I only drafted MM2 twice, and I jumped ship after winning R1 both times.
Grillo_Parlante
Contributor
Dom posted a thread a while ago about ramp in formats, and I kind of wanted to post something to this effect, that the problem with ramp design in cube is that people try to port directly from constructed formats, where ramp (or reanimator for that matter) is designed as a miserable non-interactive archetype.
I feel that this is also embodied by your post in the low power thread about sneak attack, when back in the day it was cheating out shivan phoenix and you still had a game. Now you are supposed to find the most non-interactive threats, which just makes for miserable magic.
I ended up really happy with my ramp decks when I went down to low power, because they tend to be more about managing large amounts of mana, than just resolving ramp spells into high end haymakers that end the game.
I love all of Dom's little 5-reply posts that ask an interesting question and get interesting answers. We don't get nearly as many eyes on those as on questions posed in CBS, but the few replies tend to be meaty and the posts are easy to find if you do a title-based forum search for the right topic!
Yeah, it's telling that all of the formats in which ramp has been an interactive, healthy, fun, and viable archetype - Rise of the Eldrazi, Modern Masters, Modern Masters 2 - have all been low-powered, by cube standards. Whereas when Valakut ramp was a dominant deck in standard, no one was having fun.
Yet another reason to drop down a few notches in power level!
Yet another reason to drop down a few notches in power level!
I was drafting cstick's Theros + RTR cube that he just posted over in the cube lists and I remembered a little piece of trivia that would be interesting to tell.
Fun Fact: I got to spoil a card
What card I here you ask? I shall show it to you soon. But let me tell you how I stumbled upon this happening.
Theros spoiler season. Cards were coming out daily like they usually did. You get to look at them at either Mythicspoiler or MTGS, you know the usual (although MTGS rumour mill is virtually non-existent now). I was following most of the spoilers and whenever one was posted I would check it out at the source it was posted from.
Now I saw one day that Lightning Strike was spoiled by the Oracle of Theros.
-Quick Aside on the Oracle - Now for those who weren't aware was a twitter account that WotC decided to use to pump out Greek related nonsense and throw out some spoilers every now and then. I can see what they were going for with the buzz of social media at the time, but I didn't get it (I still don't really).
So I decided to check out the oracle and see what it said (this is where I realised it was spouting nonsense daily). I clicked on the link to show me the Lightning Strike and it takes me to the Oracles photo album (an ow.ly account). I click on the show all images button to see the other card it spoiled (Vanquish the Foul) but along with that I see this other card sitting there, just staring back at me:
I go 'huh, I don't think I've seen that before, it looks pretty cool'. I go to mythicspoiler. It isn't on there. I go to MTGS. It isn't there either. I get a little giddy inside and think. Oh, god, oh god, I have to post this straight away (got to get them sweet, sweet street creds). So I go ahead and spoil the card in my own thread in MTGS.
I then just sit and stare and watch the influx of comments on the card and revel in my new found glory. The Oracle then posted its tweet with the spoiler about 2 hours later, but by then it was already out there. Take that Oracle! I beat you at your own game!
The card still holds a special place in my heart. Even if it isn't the greatest card ever, I shall always remember it as my own card. The card I got to see first.
Fun Fact: I got to spoil a card
What card I here you ask? I shall show it to you soon. But let me tell you how I stumbled upon this happening.
Theros spoiler season. Cards were coming out daily like they usually did. You get to look at them at either Mythicspoiler or MTGS, you know the usual (although MTGS rumour mill is virtually non-existent now). I was following most of the spoilers and whenever one was posted I would check it out at the source it was posted from.
Now I saw one day that Lightning Strike was spoiled by the Oracle of Theros.
-Quick Aside on the Oracle - Now for those who weren't aware was a twitter account that WotC decided to use to pump out Greek related nonsense and throw out some spoilers every now and then. I can see what they were going for with the buzz of social media at the time, but I didn't get it (I still don't really).
So I decided to check out the oracle and see what it said (this is where I realised it was spouting nonsense daily). I clicked on the link to show me the Lightning Strike and it takes me to the Oracles photo album (an ow.ly account). I click on the show all images button to see the other card it spoiled (Vanquish the Foul) but along with that I see this other card sitting there, just staring back at me:
I then just sit and stare and watch the influx of comments on the card and revel in my new found glory. The Oracle then posted its tweet with the spoiler about 2 hours later, but by then it was already out there. Take that Oracle! I beat you at your own game!
The card still holds a special place in my heart. Even if it isn't the greatest card ever, I shall always remember it as my own card. The card I got to see first.
Dom Harvey
Contributor
I just remember my fantasies of using Ground Rift as a draw-7 being dashed by actually reading the card
Chris Taylor
Contributor
Reading Triton Fortune Hunter. The word 'cast' diminished his glorious visions to a minimum.
How many times have you seen a drafter play more than 41 cards in cube as a strategic choice? There is some talk about playing more than 61 cards in competitive Constructed at the moment, and it reminded me of a BG selfmill player running 46 cards once! Share your thoughts on "big deck" Limited... (and does Battle of Wits really count?)
I've done it on occasion out of sheer laziness, but I'm guessing it's statistically incorrect 99% of the time (outside specific reasons like mill or Battle of wits, etc). Adding to your deck size just increases variance, and I'm not convinced having an extra card offsets that pretty much ever. If the card you want to add is so important, why isn't it part of your 23?
Anyone know if there is a mathematical reason why 17 lands in 41 would be legitimately better than 17/40 or 16/40? Not sure how you would prove that though but interested in hearing opinions.
Anyone know if there is a mathematical reason why 17 lands in 41 would be legitimately better than 17/40 or 16/40? Not sure how you would prove that though but interested in hearing opinions.
It has come up a little bit before, looks like, but the search software here won't work:
https://www.google.com/#q=41+site:riptidelab.com+-"page+41"
https://www.google.com/#q=41+site:riptidelab.com+-"page+41"
Thanks to Ferret's search, I can across Frank Karsten's discussion of playing extra cards (in which he shows in a variety of scenarios that less cards is better). He does concede that there are fringe cases where more could be better... let's talk about those theoretical, taboo situations.
What if you have 24 so-important cards but need to play 18 lands? I think this boils down more about decks that expect to play very long games or have very weird mana situations. Maybe a deck needs to play 4 colors to have sufficient ways to end a game but the mana won't work without 18 lands. Or a deck expects to live as long as it takes to win, but cannot win if its threats come out too late and must play the majority of its 40 cards to not lose; the player increases the deck size to add additional threats.
I have played games where I ran out of wincons in Limited; perhaps I should've been playing a 19-land/43-card deck. I have also played games where I could stop my opponent from winning but could not win myself to due to an abundance of strange artifacts/enchantments; I could see expanding my deck size to include more Disenchant effects but keep almost all other cards.
Also, there is some gold in the Karsten article comments:
Florian Koch said:
Frank Karsten said: