Card/Deck Low Power Card Spotlight

[ahadabans]

Heartbeat of Spring/Mana Flare feel like almost pure combo cards to me. Either playing them the turn you combo off or the turn before daring your opponent to beat you in one turn or lose.

One non-combo build this might be viable in is something discard heavy. If your opponent has nothing to play, it matters less that they have a million mana. Still feels dicey though since an Emrakul top deck still probably just wins.

These are cards I don't think are cube friendly. I have them in my retro list but have no confidence they are actually draftable outside storm (and even that deck just feels really ambitious most of the time).

 

[Onderzeeboot]

I know, its so weird though that a R/G heartbeat of spring existed in the old frame. What was it designed for?

My casual Tamanoa / Purity / painlands deck. I can assure you it works like a charm

 

[japahn]

I might have to create the Super Low Power Card Spotlight, but...

 

[whydirt]

I like Court Street Denizen and Ivy Lane Denizen in my loose G/W convoke archetype that rewards building up an army and having token producers. Goldnight Commander and Juniper Order Ranger play in the same space of rewarding putting down creatures, and multiple tokens in particular, in the mid-to-late game as a way to get some reach or explosive potential.

 

[safra]

I might have to create the Super Low Power Card Spotlight, but...

This was in my first casual deck, along with Springjack Sheperd and Cathar's Crusade

e: my second casual deck was a mono-blue Coalition Victory brew. I've always loved (stupid) combo.

 

[Chriskool]

This was in my first casual deck, along with Springjack Sheperd and Cathar's Crusade

have you only been playing for 5 or so years?! wow, quick learner.

 

[safra]

have you only been playing for 5 or so years?! wow, quick learner.

I started actually owning cards with RTR. I'd played a little before then but got invited to draft with a few friends and it hooked me immediately. I went 3-1 the first time i drafted off the back of Aurelia and a Boros Reckoner.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

I bet there's a good number of old fogies on here. My first successful casual deck revolved around Temporal Distortion, artifact mana, and vigilance beaters. Jeez, that was 17 years ago! And I'm pretty certain that's not close to the most, what with people like Grillo reminiscing about the good old times when spells were still good and creatures sucked

 

[ahadabans]

I'm an old person who got into the game at the start of modern who reminisces about a version of the game that I didn't even really play. And this is largely because I was shown the game by people who played during Alpha so I saw how the game used to play while I was pulling new packs and marveling at how much crappier my spells.

I honestly don't think the most powerful creatures were all that much better during Ravnica time frame than the best creatures from the past (not talking average creature quality). What made Ravnica in particular amazing was the average quality of it's commons and uncommons compared to previous sets.

And while Kamigawa Dragons might have been the gold standard for finishers, cards like Silvos, Rogue Elemental didn't look stupid next to them. And things like Hypnotic Specter and Flametongue Kavu were still some of the most powerful creatures in the game. IMO, the sets around Ravnica simply brought some needed depth to creatures. It didn't change change the base value of creatures. It simply lopped off the chaff at the bottom - cards which had always been simply unplayable.

Creatures didn't get stupid until Lorwyn and after. Lorwyn literally changed everything about the game.

 

[Rasmus Källqvist]

I've been enjoying these history introspective we've been having lately. I played for like a month as a young person during Lorwyn, and then came back during Return to Ravnica, so I'm pretty imbued into the modern relation between spells and creatures and the etb-paradigm.

edit: I played red goblins in lorwyn! I just remembered when I look through the card gallery at mythicspoilers (they have a ton of older sets, to those who didn't know. great way to explore).

 

[sigh]

Lorwyn block brought on the New World Order, so yes it literally did change the game.

 

[inscho]

my first constructed deck had frenetic efreet....pretty close to 20 years agoo_O

 

[Chriskool]

A friend and I made "Chess" decks patterned after a Duelist magazine article. I got the white deck. Who do you think won more?



VERSUS

 

[Peter LaCara]

Y'all are nuts. I started playing in Revised (though there are large gaps here and there, aside from a handful of drafts), and even an old fogey like me can tell that the game is better than it's ever been, and a big part of that is NWO. Mainly because the game finally plays the way I wanted it to play like 20+ years ago. The fact that creatures were such a joke and were considered for suckers was the reason that I quit for so long, because it just felt so wrong.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

Y'all are nuts. I started playing in Revised (though there are large gaps here and there, aside from a handful of drafts), and even an old fogey like me can tell that the game is better than it's ever been, and a big part of that is NWO.

Oh, I couldn't agree more!

 

[Aston]

The first deck I remember building myself was beast tribal with the mono combo of multiple Wirewood Savages and my one Anurid Brushhopper to kind of draw cards very slowly.

I also had a black control deck with False Cure to counter the heavy Noble Purpose/Worship metagame.

No one had any sweepers.

 

[Chris Taylor]

How does wirewood symbiote and anurid brushhopper draw cards?

 

[Jason Waddell]

I started playing during Scars of Mirodin *ducks*

 

[Rasmus Källqvist]

How does wirewood symbiote and anurid brushhopper draw cards?

Cycles through your deck. One card during drawstep, discard 2, then get one from the etb. Plus minus zero, but at least you've churned through the deck a little faster!

 

[Chris Taylor]

Ah

 

[Fulcrum]

I started playing during Scars of Mirodin *ducks*

Intro Pack Blade Splicer was my very first rare and I'm so happy that it still gets to get played in my cube.

 

[japahn]

I've started "playing" in 1996, when MtG was a fever here in Brazil (USD was cheap). Fourth Edition, Ice Age and Homelands, terrible cards basically. I think the only card from that time that made it to my cube was 4th ed. Animate Dead. I was 8 at the time, and though I knew the rules roughly, I just really learned to play properly with Shandalar (1998). Until then, for some reason, I thought you could only attack with one creature each turn. Also thought colorless mana could pay for any color of mana, so An-Havva Township was op. That's what you get when nobody around you knows how to play and you have to learn by reading the Ice Age rules book.

Played a lot, always casually, during Odyssey/Onslaught (2001-02), then standard Kamigawa/Ravnica (2004-05). Went on and off the game a few times, always kept up with what was going on.

In 2010, some friends got interested but nobody had money, and I made my first cube with the cards I had lying around from all the time. Had heaps of fun with it.

Curiously, had my first non-cube draft only last year (no LGS/no group/couldn't afford drafting before that). My DCI has nothing but DTK, ORI and SOI prereleases. Still think cube is the best format.

 

[Kirblinx]

I started playing during Scars of Mirodin *ducks*

Well, lucky for you! This week only you can relive your glorious beginnings on MTGO, by drafting the epitome of draft formats: 3x SOM!

Where you can enjoy such treats as this deck (currently 1-0, waiting for round 2):

(Why did I get myself into this mess :\)

EDIT: Just lost in round 2 to a bunch of UW flyers. Won the first game, then flooded out in G3.

 

[Aston]

I don't think any of the Scars block draft formats were "good" due to many insane 6 mana rare bombs and the problems that infect caused, but man, I loved it for some reason, especially Scars/Besieged.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

Proliferate is near and dear to my heart, but infect was pretty miserable in limited. Depending on how many people were moving in on infect, either you destroyed the whole table or you couldn't get enough playables to make it work.