Magic: The Gathering C/D

freighter doesn't seem on the same level as something like triple spirits to me, it's just more ubiquitous due to being colorless. reminds me more of vulshok morningstar from original mirrodin or something like that, where it's good in most decks and wins you games but also has diminishing returns with multiple copies as well as with better versions of itself at higher rarities

I *really* dig fabricate as a limited mechanic. the decisions are very skill-testing and rarely obvious, unlike some this-or-that mechanics. they've been making fabricate-type-creatures before this set, I guess you can't have it evergreen because it punishes x/1s so hard.

format would be a little better if renegade freighter was not a common. pretty sure that's going to be one of the things people say about it a year from now, similar to trip spirits in m15 etc.

yeah Fabricate has been surprisingly difficult, especially since there's a +1/+1 counters matter theme and an artifact theme. Also: lots of 1-toughness creatures.

Freighter I think is alright since a high artifact pick, but yeah it may be better than expected since there don't seem to be a whole lot of 4-power guys that it trades with. Which is also why the Crew 4+ vehicles aren't so good. Pinging 6/6 one was quite good in my testing but yeah big difference between Crew 3 and Crew 4.

i 3-0ed my first draft league attempt last night with a freighter in my sideboard because i had fleetwheel cruiser in my deck and really didn't have the creature count to want a 2nd vehicle

if anyone is interesting in watching someone really go off with some of the interactions in the set i would highly recommend the 2nd draft on this lsv stream. draft starts about 1:27. looks like a total pile but pretty incredible/hilarious how he is able to make it work. https://www.twitch.tv/lsv/v/93632563

is that one of the ones where he combos off with aetherflux reservoir?

lsv streaming more often is such a major boon for mtg on twitch, there's so few truly entertaining streamers still

he just uses it for incidental lifegain to keep him alive. the main engine is a combo using the r/u guy that makes thopters with energy and the module and enchantment that make energy off of creatures/artifacts, so with them all out he can make thopters for 3 and get 2 back. one game the other guy is at 20 and lsv survives until he can make thopters for 1 energy each, also getting a +1/+1 counter each time, and creates 20+ damage worth of thopters in one end step, about 2 cards from decking

draft leagues have really been a boon to streamers like LSV, they can just crank out one after another without lots of dead space or confusing double queuing. I've been enjoying following these quite a lot lately.

that's awesome. I played a U/R deck in my 2nd draft and yea - some real shenanigans possible if you get the right uncommons. A lot of these cards slot together in funny ways.

i checked back into twitch for the new set and there are now multiple streamers on a given weeknight with several hundred viewers which is obv still p lol in comp with the really popular games but is tons more than was there even a few months ago. but yeah not always the most captivating personalities. kenji blazed the trail but i can't really ever get engaged watching him. caleb durward appears to be trying the kenji route with 365 day consecutive streams and is kind of funny at least. and there seem to be a raft of respected mtgo grinders with like 50 viewers whose streams seem pretty good from a learning pov but not so much for entertainment.

yeah i always found kenji obnoxious and most of the other people just aren't that engaging. I still like MJ but he doesn't stream much anymore and is certainly an acquired taste. lsv is just a natural at it, probably partly from recording draft videos for years before twitch was even a thing.

the draft RS linked is the most LSV of LSV drafts ever

i miss watching dzy stream but am happy lsv is streaming mtgo more. i cant think of another streamer i actively enjoy watching and dont just put on as background noise.

i had my worst gp ever this wknd in atlanta, missing day two for the first time. not really happy w/ how i played but my pool was beyond awful. one thing that ive found tough in the practice limited weve done over the last two weeks is how hard it is to play from behind in this format. its not just obvious stuff like renegade freighter but the quality and cheapness of tricks, how most common removal seems better offensively, how little payoff there is higher on the mana curve. going in to the gp a couple of ppl were arguing for defaulting to 16 land because of how punishing flooding is and ive kinda come around to that. i was also p wrong abt the playability of the 0/4 reach two drop, although i think its now getting overplayed a little. mostly i wld like to figure out this format soon. at least standard seems fun

oh personal limited development criticism - i wish blue had a real unsummon effect. obv punishing for vehicles but i think thats fine given how strong the cheap ones are. still been happy getting ppl with the one mana one.

by real unsummon you mean one that can hit untapped creatures? seems like that would just further contribute to the problem you're describing, the existing one is limited to defensive use rather than removing blockers. blue could probably use a little bit of extra help in this set though, i'm just not sure that's the place to put it rather than like giving it a real 2nd 2-drop instead of the unplayable curio vendor

would have been cute if the curio vendor made a do-nothing artifact token, though thats the sort of thing they dont like to do these days due to fear of confusing new players

sorry to hear atl went badly man. from the ~ 8 drafts i have done i have got the impression that the super low curve 16 land aggro style of deck is a trap because the midrange cards are so strong and there are punishing cards like the 1 mana bounce and the 3 mana instant artifact kill/lifegain. r/w in particular feels like the colour combo that's most disastrous if it doesn't get all the way there. the 3 drafts i won 1 was a sweet bw recursion/removal deck and the other 2 were basically just attacking with thriving rhinos which i think might just be the most powerful thing you can do in the set.

the argument is more that even yr midrange decks shld be playing 16 land because theres so little to do w/ excess mana and getting behind on board is so punishing

re: unsummon i think its more that a disperse type card might reduce some of the outsized disadvantage of being on the draw rather than making slower more defensive decks better. agree re: blue tho - curio vender is one of the worst commons in the set and the 1/3 scry energy guy is... not great either

scry guy seems fine to me, but it seems like they have mandated that one of blue's 2 common 2 drops every set must be awful

feels like every recent set has had a blue 2/1 with minor upside and they decided that was too pushed and went vanilla

the skulk one was bad too though, need a better ability to make coral merfolk playable in this day and age. The one from bfz that gave unblockable late game and was also an ally is about where you have to land

I didn't even play OGW enough times to learn whether the prowess one was playable

nope

feel like 'we can't give blue good 2 drops at common' is more some maro colorpie nonsense than a real design issue

i don't even mind if theyre bad, it's just nice when they actually do something at all

DTK is a good example of a set where they found 2 that both felt good to put in decks (palace familiar and elusive spellfist)

1/3 skulk dude that froze a guy for a turn from the last set was alright

cider is right, Freighter is no Triplicate Spirits, and Vulshok Morningstar is a good comparison. It's probably the best common to first pick because you'll play it almost no matter what but once you've decided a color, I don't think it's the best. If I'm in red, I'd take Welding Sparks over it most of the time. With stuff like Sparks, Impeccable Timing, Appetite for the Unknown, and especially Select for Inspection, there's a lot of times you will lose tempo on Freighter. Trip Spirits I would take and play every copy I see, up to like ten copies or something. Like equipment, I don't think a deck wants more than 3 vehicles, though don't get me wrong, Freighter is still one of the best commons

I also haven't found a streamer I like as much as lsv. There's a few streamers that are skilled but lack charisma and then way too many who are entertaining but just aren't good enough players and I find myself yelling at the screen. I really miss when Owen T would stream regularly. On the streamer note, I recently played against Marshall while he was streaming, in a very challenging match that he ended up winning. Was cool to go back and watch his vid and see how I could have played better

I wasn't saying it was the best (haven't played the format a ton yet), just that it's kinda annoying to see a card like that game after game and even if it's not broken it feels like it was a mistake at common. would be pretty fine at uncommon.

ok I can see that, but in my six or so drafts, I haven't found it to be a nuisance yet. it's still early in the format tho

It's super sad to me that Cuneo doesn't stream a lot anymore because it was always such a delight to watch him, but him stopping seemed to coincide exactly with him getting good again, so ~

I love cuneo too, one of my t5 fav players

apparently close to 100 ppl at the pro tour decided that the turbo aetherworks marvel decks were consistent enough, this is pretty weird to have such an all-in combo deck be a major part of standard after they've been suppressing them for so long

so I was riding pretty high tonight after 4-0ing FNM with my spirits deck, didn't really think things could get much better. Then I opened Mana Crypt.

not bad!

nice work Moodles

So far I am not digging the Aetherworks deck at the PT. Keep uninteractive decks out of Standard please, we already have Modern for that. I do find it amusing though that Contingency Plan made it into a Constructed deck, a card I absolutely never would have guessed

I mean to say that I am not digging WATCHING it, I'm sure it's a good enough deck to compete if that many pros are on it

do we know which if any of the big teams are playing it? it could be a high risk high reward choice by worse teams trying to spike the event.

This was the deck I faced in the finals last night. It turns out Aetherworks Marvel doesn't match up well against Spell Queller, and if you can't cast Aetherworks Marvel, the whole plan kind of falls apart. My biggest challenge was managing the Cranes because they are such good blockers against most of my deck.

yeah spell queller just shits on the marvel deck

Not sure which teams specifically, but they've had a couple pros on camera playing Aetherworks. Owen Turtenwald is on it, which is usually a sign that the deck is good

no doubt it is good, it can pretty reliably crank out a turn 4 monster, but like so many combo decks in Standard, it is a bit fragile.

yeah it seems unplayable if people are ready for it since there is so little you can do to protect your combo, finding it is already hard enough

shota having multiple main deck ceremonious rejections was p lol yesterday

It's a good card!

PT top 8 #5 for Lee Shi Tian?? I don't feel like anyone ever talks about electing him to the hall of fame, maybe because he's not even eligible for a couple more years, but I feel like this has got to cement him.

was hoping there was a dynavolt tower deck, that's my favorite energy card in kaladesh

pierre dagen has a ur spells deck w/ 4 towers

oh wait, misunderstood

after flying high at FNM, I decided on a whim to take my deck to a PPTQ yesterday, which was my first competitive REL event in over a year. Ended up 4-2, 15th out of 48. I would have loved to sneak into the top 8, but I'm pretty happy with the experience overall. I took down 3 different energy decks: one Aetherworks, one Dynavolt Tower control, and one that was trying to make infinite servos. I got absolutely demolished by Grixis emerge, not really sure what I can do to stop that deck's graveyard shenanigans.

Now I'm getting ready for Game Day. I like a bunch of the U/W decks that popped up at the Pro Tour, so I may do something similar. I've also been gathering up cards for R/B aggro and R/W vehicles. Don't know which is the best direction. Spirits feels like it's not quite tier 1, but it has the element of surprise, not a lot of people are preparing for it, plus it is really good against all these combo decks that are popping up. It is pretty weak to delirium and emerge, and maybe 50/50 against the aggro decks.

R/B and R/W seem much more powerful, but are such known quantities at this point that they seem less attractive. Which way should I go?

i like the spirits deck (both the full tribal version and the UW midrange one from the PT) so if you've got a lot of practice with that i'd just keep running it

i'm working on metalwork colossus ramp myself but i haven't gotten it to a state where i'm completely happy with it yet - i'll be playing either that or spirits at the grand prix next weekend

do you have a particular spirits build you like or is that TBD?