Magic the Gathering Arena

[spectre]

Yeah, the chance to upgrade icr was lowered to something utterly ridiculous like 1% or 5%, depends on the number of wins. Seems like they no longer want it to be the no.1 played mode.
I still can't be arsed to grind past Gold in ranked constructed, because that extra booster I'd get as a reward is nothing. In the same time, I'd waste grinding the same RDW/TurboFog/WW/Golgari carousel,
I could actually earn a good bunch of gold and hopefully a useful card or two in bo1 or bo3 events.

The problem with RDW is everyone's expecting it (swear to dog, I am genuinely surprised if I don't run into four, five in constructed event), will preside against it and will mulligan for the right cards... at least the guys who know what they're doing.
Even WUR has smartened up and packing 4x Revitalize.
I never seen Golgari to be that backbreaking vs. RDW. There are guys who run Golden Showers and Moment of Craving which will give you a sound whipping, but the standard explore build is all about the Wildgrowth Wanker and recuring them with Find//Finality.
Add a bunch of lava coils, two or three, and the matchup boils down to who draws their thing first, but RDW has more bolts then they have wankers.

 

[Steezus]

Tbf, I feel like every Golgari I ran into had Moment of Craving and/or Demise.

Either way, I'm not mad. This was the first time I played RDW on Arena, simply because I have all the cards for it and I'm not sure yet what to do with my wildcards. I was more so addressing the general consensus that RDW is ruining magic with its oppressiveness, when in my experience it's not that huge of a threat.

 

[Jason Liang]

With RDW, sometimes you draw 5 bolts and a Viashino Pyromancer, or two Risk Factors and you pretty much just unload on their face and win.

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[Dawkinsfan69]

they lowered the chance of upgrade by a pretty big chunk in the last update. their justification is that they did some shit to protect people from getting duplicate cards or something

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[Projas]

they lowered the chance of upgrade by a pretty big chunk in the last update. their justification is that they did some shit to protect people from getting duplicate cards or something

The new dupe system actually seems like a pretty rough deal too. You have to get 50 duplicate mythics or 100 rares to be able to afford... 1 sealed entry. I think I actually prefered the stupid vault to this because that at least got you precious wildcards.

 

[Dawkinsfan69]

Yea I def agree especially considering I'll probably never get 5+ rare/mythic tier cards and I liked playing constructed for rares

 

[Steezus]

they lowered the chance of upgrade by a pretty big chunk in the last update. their justification is that they did some shit to protect people from getting duplicate cards or something

The new dupe system actually seems like a pretty rough deal too. You have to get 50 duplicate mythics or 100 rares to be able to afford... 1 sealed entry. I think I actually prefered the stupid vault to this because that at least got you precious wildcards.

The vault is still in place in addition to the small gem rewards for fifth copies.

I mainly play limited so it doesn't affect me that much, but yeah, the tradeoff seems bad.

 

[Jason Liang]

A couple of nice wins today ~

Clean win against Selesnya, felt good. I couldn't target the opponent with Drill Bit or Lightning Strike due to Shalai (and was mana poor throughout the match) but just chipped away with aggressive jolly men.

Top decked Lannery Storm for a bizarre win against a decent Undergrowth build. I couldn't get in on the ground due to his Stichers and other chumps. Thought I made a mistake by dropping Judith instead of Cannonade, but he nukes his own horde (as well as mine) with Finality on his turn, so the Cannonade wouldn't have really mattered, so between her +1/+0 and her death pings, Judith ended up dealing about 7 damage (with 2 Firebrands) putting the opponent down to 6. Thought I made another mistake since I played Ruin Raider instead of keeping up mana for Bedevil (or Lightning Strike!), but he casted a 2nd Find on his turn to play the Golgari Raiders and put the Chucacubra to his hand. So I had to block with the Raider to live and topdecked Lannery for the win (could have been a 3rd Lightning Strike too).

Also won a good win against Grixis without me drawing a 2nd land until turn 4. Didn't think I would pull that game through but I had 1cc plays the first three turns. Dire Fleet Poisoner helped to kill a Thief of Sanity and I just chipped away at this health until he hit 0.

Am torn on Experimental Frenzy. Had a game where I ended never getting a great Frenzy turn, but just kept playing 1-2 creatures a turn and dropping land and just simply attritioned my opponent to death. As long as your opponent isn't killing you, Frenzy is going to keep you ahead even with bad luck off your draws. Ruin Raider and Theater of Horors are both definitely better for this build but Frenzy is also playable if not that great.

Also cooling on Carnival/ Carnage. Only used Carnival once in 12 matches today, to counter a Fungal Infection. Casted Carnage a few times but there are far better spells for 4cc (although I did hit a Lightning Strike and a Wizardd's Lightning from a RDW player). Fanatical Firebrand already does both things that Carrnival does.

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[Scruffy]

Had a game where I ended never getting a great Frenzy turn, but just kept playing 1-2 creatures a turn and dropping land and just simply attritioned my opponent to death

still more cards than you would have had in your hand probably
frenzy is good, not sure the "best" way to use it has been found yet though

 

[Jason Liang]

Am torn on Experimental Frenzy

in my experience its too expensive, theaters for the win.

fast pirates are nice but... I kind of like the theme of plundering treasures. Is there any fully pirates/treasures themed deck? I was unable to find such

Treasure has its own win condition, Revel in Riches, which is an interesting victory condition, but these days it probably works better with the new card Smothering Tithe than with Pirates.

There are several decent pirate and pirate themed cards that create Treasure tokens, including Lannery Storm, Heartless Plunder, and Dire Fleet Hoarder, but there's no real good payoff for it. Treasure is mostly useful to help Pirate decks color fix (especially for tri-color pirates) and perhaps ramp a little, so its more a subtheme than a main theme. It also activates artifact-themed Pirates like Desperate Castaways and other artifact-powered spells like Karn's construct tokens. Prying Blade is also an underrated card for these purposes. Perhaps Deadeye Plunderers for payoff but honestly they need to be 4cc not 5cc.

The other deck that effectively uses Treasure in standard is Thousand Year Storm, using Pirate's Pillage and Brass's Bounty to generate near infinite mana.

Had a game where I ended never getting a great Frenzy turn, but just kept playing 1-2 creatures a turn and dropping land and just simply attritioned my opponent to death

still more cards than you would have had in your hand probably
frenzy is good, not sure the "best" way to use it has been found yet though

For Standard the card to make it work is definitely Treasure Map.

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[Scruffy]

For Standard the card to make it work is definitely Treasure Map.

and llanowar elves to play it earlier and the dinosaur that lets you play an extra land imo, but sometimes frenzy decks just "fizzle" out for some reason...

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[Jason Liang]

Revel in Riches

yeah but it does feel slow. You drop all those expensive cards(4 mana +) to add few treasures.

Was actually thinking along the lines of getting prying blades on departed deckhands(so far in my pirates deck this card is mvp), add relic seeker vraska.

smothering tithe seem slow and more like a counter to specific control decks. Brass bounty seem cool finisher for long going game.

dead eye plunder is crazy expensive but... once you can afford them they are going to be crazy strong. Honestly it feels like once i get to it, ill be busy spending my treasures to buy stuff from theaters and finish enemy quickly

Actually I just noticed Storm the Vault, might be the payoff you are looking for. But there isn't a build in standard that uses it; probably needed to be 2cc or 3cc. Treasure Map is another great card that makes Treasure tokens.

Another possibility is to use the Treasure tokens to count towards Ascend, so that you can activate Timestream Navigator and other Ascend cards as the payoff.

 

[Scruffy]

i'm just super butthurt that my dino-frenzy deck doesn't work really

 

[Jason Liang]

Dino tribe is just too expensive for Frenzy besides Wayward Swordtooth and perhaps Ghalta. And the dino support cards (Commute with Dinosaurs and Thunderherd Migration) are ill-fitted with Frenzy.

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[Jason Liang]

Storm the Vault

forgot about this, it sounds just like what i need

It's once per damage step, not once per creature though (so at most you can get 2 Treasures a turn if you have a creature with First strike) and you still need a payoff for the mana.

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[Scruffy]

Dino tribe is just too expensive for Frenzy besides Wayward Swordtooth and perhaps Ghalta. And the dino support cards (Commute with Dinosaurs and Thunderherd Migration) are ill-fitted with Frenzy.

i meant frenzy + swordtooth, no other dinos in the deck

edit
this is the deck:

10 Mountain (RIX) 195
8 Forest (RIX) 196
2 Evolving Wilds (RIX) 186
2 Rootbound Crag (XLN) 256

4 Experimental Frenzy (GRN) 99
4 Wayward Swordtooth (RIX) 150
4 Treasure Map (XLN) 250
4 Shock (M19) 156
3 Lava Coil (GRN) 108
3 Llanowar Elves (M19) 314
3 Lightning Strike (XLN) 149
3 Light Up the Stage (RNA) 107
2 Dryad Greenseeker (M19) 178
2 Banefire (M19) 130
2 Fight with Fire (DAR) 119
2 Runaway Steam-Kin (GRN) 115
1 Shivan Fire (DAR) 142
1 Karn, Scion of Urza (DAR) 1

tell me what i'm doing wrong

 

[Jason Liang]

Storm the Vault

forgot about this, it sounds just like what i need

It's once per damage step, not once per creature though (so at most you can get 2 Treasures a turn if you have a creature with First strike) and you still need a payoff for the mana.

you are right that ive missed it. That being said it could be handled with fanatical firebrands if you need a burst of treasures(or before transformation)

or just use trove of temptation. Or use those pirates that sacrifice creatures to get treasures

Combat damage

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG