Site News Contest: You Design the Duel Decks

Jason Waddell

Jason Waddell

Administrator
Staff member
Contest time!

Lately I've been having a blast with pick-up-and-play Magic formats. James and I have played a dozen+ matches of cube pack wars, and I want to take it a step further. I want fun decks locked and loaded to battle for whenever I get that Magic itch.

Duel Decks!

Your task is to design two 60-card decks that will be played against each other. You have access to the following:
1) all the cards on the RiptideLab community MTGO account.
2) a budget of $3 to buy cards from mtgotraders.com (if you want to spend more than this, feel free loan / donate your own cash and cards).

Judging

I will playtest each submission on stream. The playtesters (TBD) and I will pick our favorite with an eye towards:
1) Fun Factor - How much fun are the matches?
2) Feel - I don't actually want these decks to feel like cube draft decks. They should feel unique! There are tons of cheap but playable cards on MTGO. Get creative with your budget. There are some sweet cards you can get for as low as a penny.
3) Replayability - The decks should be straightforward enough to pick-up-and-play, but be fun and rewarding enough to play multiple times.
4) Interactivity - I want the games to feel interactive. Don't be afraid to dig up weird low-power removal spells or disruption.

(optional) Theme - duel decks are great when they have some theme to them. It may even help you to drive you design.


Prize

Winning design gets like $35 cash or something.

Deadline

TBD





(could somebody with access to the RipLab MTGO account upload the contents somewhere? should we make a massive cubetutor cube with the contents?)
 
Jamie

Jamie

This is completely hypothetical as I don't intend to enter the contest, but if you'd be willing to playtest some matches via, say, Cockatrice if need be (for people who don't want to risk buying cards up front for a design that may not be the winning one), then this could open up even more design space for anyone who's willing to sacrifice (some of) their would-be prize money in order to fund the purchase of cards used in their design.
 
Kirblinx

Kirblinx

Developer
Staff member
Jamie said:
This is completely hypothetical as I don't intend to enter the contest, but if you'd be willing to playtest some matches via, say, Cockatrice if need be (for people who don't want to risk buying cards up front for a design that may not be the winning one), then this could open up even more design space for anyone who's willing to sacrifice (some of) their would-be prize money in order to fund the purchase of cards used in their design.
Click to expand...

While this does seem like a good idea, I feel like it opens up the window a little too much. You could probably just then search the internet for some good casual decks, slap your name on them and call it an entry.

The fact there is a specific pool of cards (and even some wiggle room with the $3 extra cards) makes it an interesting contest and also keeps the door open for more iterations of this contest without feeling like it is the exact same.

While some people may or may not agree with MaRo, the guy does spout one thing often that is very true and is very apt for where I am going with this:

Restrictions Breed Creativity

ps. Welcome to the forums. I can say with personal experience that you have a great name :D
 
Jason Waddell

Jason Waddell

Administrator
Staff member
Jamie said:
This is completely hypothetical as I don't intend to enter the contest, but if you'd be willing to playtest some matches via, say, Cockatrice if need be (for people who don't want to risk buying cards up front for a design that may not be the winning one), then this could open up even more design space for anyone who's willing to sacrifice (some of) their would-be prize money in order to fund the purchase of cards used in their design.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I'm willing to be flexible. For what it's worth, to clarify, I'd be providing the $3 mentioned in the context heading, if that wasn't clear.
 
Jason Waddell

Jason Waddell

Administrator
Staff member
I took a first pass at a deck, but it needs some work.

LAOBG2B.png


Here's the thought behind the deck. I wanted to start with the UG top of library theme we all know and love, with a base of 4x Halimar Depths and 4x Treasure Hunt. These are kind of pet cards of mine from when I started playing Standard, but I don't think I'm utilizing them to their fullest potential. Are there any cool interactions we can add here?

I really liked the interaction of library rearrangement with Thought Scour, and wanted to add a touch of self-mill / dredge with Life from the Loam, Satyr Wayfinder and Hooting Mandrills.

If we have a cost reduced Hooting Mandrills (or Emerge card, or Spire Golemn), a fun piece of tech could be an Eldritch Evolution to pump out an 8-drop. Anybody have a fun 8-drop in mind? one issue I have currently is that the creatures I'm running, with exception to Coiling Oracle and Satyr Wayfinder, don't reallllly want to be emerged.

I think the deck could also use a few more fun swingy effects, like a mass bounce spell or something. Help me spice this puppy up!

And if you have any ideas for this deck to duel against, please let me know.
 
Jason Waddell

Jason Waddell

Administrator
Staff member
71MbeJX.png


Draft 0 of a Daretti/Squee Mardu deck.

It's a madness / inspired / vehicle / clue token / metalcraft mashup. Going to playtest these in a bit if anyone wants to join. It's possible they match up terribly right now.
 
shamizy

shamizy

Sweet, cubetutor visual spoiler is up. The one on tappedout was unorganized had some weird overlay thing that was throwing me off. Way more inspired and interested now.

Do you want us to post decks we come up with here and label whatever our final submission is when submission rolls around?
 
Jason Waddell

Jason Waddell

Administrator
Staff member
shamizy said:
Sweet, cubetutor visual spoiler is up. The one on tappedout was unorganized had some weird overlay thing that was throwing me off. Way more inspired and interested now.

Do you want us to post decks we come up with here and label whatever our final submission is when submission rolls around?
Click to expand...

Yeah, that sounds good. Definitely helps to get input from others.

I ordered the cards for my decks from mtgotraders. They don't deliver for another few hours, so no testing yet. Excited to see how these two wonky decks match up against each other.

After I get these tuned, I want to maybe try some higher power deckbuilding.
 
Jason Waddell

Jason Waddell

Administrator
Staff member
Mad Prophet said:
This deck looks like it could use some Me.
Click to expand...


Could be! I think it fits thematically, but may be a bit below the curve for this deck. Actually, I played some matches with Kirb, and the Mardu deck was a touch underpowered, so I made some tweaks.

X28GPSP.png


New cards:


Lingering Souls is obviously a good stuff card, but works well with both sides of a card like Smuggler's Copter (can be discarded for value, can crew very efficiently).

Wellspring gives us something that wants to be sac'd by Daretti and Pia / Kiran.

Gild was considered to maybe be this guy:


But I think it might be too powerful with crewing. Simic doesn't really have answers, and once you get it online I expect the game to become frustrating. Guild doesn't have that problem, and also serves as another instant-speed Metalcraft enabler which is occasionally relevant.

Artifact density is in a good place now. The only other card I would maybe want an extra copy of is Pain Seer, but the 2-drop slot is a little stacked.

Considering dropping Reckless Wurm but don't really have a replacement in mind.
 
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