I'm on the draw with a respectable hand of Mountain, Marsh, Catacomb, Key, Schematic, Touch, and Herald T1. Opp plays EW and cracks for swamp. I top UD and play Marsh. T2. Opp plays Abbey and Scrounger. I top EW and play Catacomb and Schematic. T3. Opp plays another EW and swings with Scrounger. I take it. Opp passes. I top another Marsh, play the mountain, and Touch my Schematic (that almost sounds dirty, doesn't it?) and swing for 6. Opp has Push tho. I get another token and my Schematic back. Opp cracks his EW for a plains. T4. Opp plays Ayli and another plains and swings. I take it again. I top Push, play the EW and crack for Island, and then Push his Ayli and drop Schematic again and swing for 2. T5. Opp plays Stockpile and Needle Spires and swings with Scrounger. I take, putting me at 11. I top Summit, play Marsh, and Improvise Herald onto the table tapping all of my artis to leave 2 mana up for his ability. Opp discards his other Abbey at my eot. T6+. Opp peeks and draw and concedes. I play it out. Opp drops land and Kalitas. I nuke his Scrounger at eot (avoiding Stockpile trigger). I top land and try to UD his Kalitas, but he has mana up to sack it to Stockpile. After that, opp was in topdeck mode and never drew an answer to Herald. I used Key to cycle excess land and got a TSN down on the following turn. Opp died the turn after that.
Game 2 vs Esper Control (39)
Spoiler
I'm on the play (thank goodness!) with another decent hand of Fumarole, Hollow, Island, Swamp, Schematic, Harvester, and Touch. T1. I play Fumarole. Opp plays Hollow. T2. I top Yahenni's, play Swamp and Schematic. Opp plays Chapel. T3. I top UD, play Island and Touch and swing for 6, all of which goes through. He plays another land and passes. T4. I top another UD, play the Hollow, and swing again. No response. I pass (no point playing into his counters). He drops another land and passes. T5. I top another Touch. Nice to have a backup, but the first one is doing fine. I swing and he takes. He's at 2. He plays land and taps out to Confiscation Coup my Schematic. UD finishes him off.
Game 3 vs Rakdos Vampires (35)
Spoiler
I'm on the play with Island, Catacomb, Map, Smuggy, 2x UD, and Saheeli. Seems strong! T1. I play Island and Map. Opps drops a Swamp. T2. I top Falls, play Catacomb, and Smug. Opp plays Swamp and Heir. T3. I top Harvester and play Falls. I have the option of playing Saheeli, UDing his Heir, or passing and waiting for him to flip it first. I choose the last option. He drops a Marsh and discards Youths to flip Heir, playing them off the Madness. Hmm, prolly should a nuked it last turn after all. Instead I UD the Youths, taking 3 from Heir. T4. I top Marionette. Crack the map for a Swamp and play it and pass leaving UD up again. He swings and I UD. Then he drops another Marsh and plays Bloodhall Priests. That's not good. T5. I top Colossus. Great. I prolly should have just played Saheeli plussed her here, to try to scry for a land and eat an attack but instead I play Harvester, hoping for some crew next turn. Opp swings and then plays Scrounger. T6. I top TSN. Well... there's some crew. But it is too slow... I play Saheeli instead, but I know its pretty much over. I plus her and put the land on the topdeck. He swings with both, taking Saheeli out with his Priest. Then he plays Gifted Aetherborn. T7. Top the land and play it and drop TSN.. what else can I do? He drops a land and plays Youths and swings for lethal.
Game 4 vs Mardu Vehicles (37)
Spoiler
I'm on the play yet again with Island, Marsh, Fumarole, Map, Push, Smug, and Touch. Can't complain! T1. I play Fumarole. He plays Mountain and Apprentice. T2. I top UD and play Island and Map. He plays land and Smug and swings for 2. T3. I top another Map, crack the first one for a Swamp, play Smug, and then drop the Swamp. He crews and I Push before he can loot. Then he plays land and Harvester. T4. I top a Swamp and cast Touch on my Smug. I swing and loot, drawing Falls and discarding the Swamp. Finally I drop Marsh and play the other Map. He drops Scrounger and uses it to crew and swings for 5, gaining 3 off Harvester. T5. I top Kingpin and swing with Copter. I loot a Noxious. Hmmm.... After a bit of thought I figure I'm better off keeping the Kingpin and playing it this turn so I discard Noxious, play the Falls and Kingpin, and pass, leaving up mana for UD. Opp plays Depalia and crews Harvester with his Scrounger. He swings, paying energy to give it lifelink. I UD it in response to the energy trigger. He concedes. I play it out, topping Saheeli next turn and swinging/pinging to take him to 4. He plays the hasty 2/1 pilot and swings but Kingpin absorbs some of the damage. I top Ballista and then loot it into a UD, but he has no removal for my Smug so its moot.
This was a good'un Game 5 vs Rakdos Vehicles (40)
Spoiler
And again, on the play. I have a slightly sketchy hand of Catacomb, EW, Map, Copter, Key, TSN, and Colossus. T1. I crack EW for Island. Opp plays R/B tapland. T2. I top Schematic. and play Catacomb and Map. Opp plays Mountain and Bomat and pings me. T3. I top Fumarole and play it and then play Schematic. Opp plays land and Thopter Engineer and swings with Bomat and thopter. I trade my servo for the Bomat - I wanted it for Copter but if he plays his hand out Bomat draw would be a big problem - better to nip it in the bud. T4. I top Hollow, crack the Map for a Swamp, and play TSN. He drops a land and plays Fleetwheel and swings hard, taking me to 11. T5. I top Push. Hmm, that could be handy. I play Hollow, Key, and Smug and make sure to leave up a for Push. He crews his Fleetwheel and swings. I use Key to discard Colossus and then sac my thopter token (TSN) and Schematic to return it to hand, enabling Revolt and scoring me a token. Then I Push the Fleetwheel. I'm so boss. He plays Apprentice and passes. T6. I pay for Key and top Herald and Harvester. I play Harvester and pass. He plays Smug and crews it with his thopter token and then swings with it. I crew my Harvester and block. He responds with UD on Harvester. I SHOULD have discarded Colossus to Key again and sacked a token and Harvester in response to dodge the burn from UD but didn't think of it in time. Possibly the misplay that cost me the game. T7. I top a land and play it and then play Herald, tapping Key and some tokens to improvise it out, leaving up 2 mana to use it if necessary. Opp discards another Fleetwheel at eot. Huh. Opp is ok tho - he has another UD. Ouchies. I respond to it by sacking my servo token to take out his thopter token. He responds to that by using it to crew his Smug. He then swings with all. I could chump his Apprentice with my Smug, but I'm so low on health I think I'm better off trading. Maybe a misplay? I loot a land. Meh. I pay for the Key and get Ballista and Harvester. Noice! I play Harvester and Ballista for x=1 and swing with a thopter token, drawing Yahenni's and finally pass. He swings with his Apprentice and Engineer. Uh-oh. I crew Harvester and he responds with his THIRD FRIGGIN UD! I'm at 3 life so my options are limited. I Key my Colossus and then sac Harvester and the tapped thopter token to get it back and dodge the UD burn and then block with my other 2 tokens. T8. I top Colossus and Push. I swing with Ballista, pinging him and getting Kingpin. I drain the Ballista to zap him and then Yahenni's his board clear and play Kingpin for free. His board is clear, his hand is empty. I'm at 3 life but I have Inventor's Fair and TSN down. This feels like a comeback! He topdecks Bloodhall and drops it, zapping me to 1. I prolly should have Key-dumpted a Colossus for the extra draw here, but didn't. T9. I Kingpin scries another Kingpin of the TSN token. I bottom it and draw... the 3rd one. -_- Bad timing guys... I needed Noxious! I hate to do it, but my only hope is to discard Colossus to Key and then sac Key and the token to trigger Revolt. So that's what I do, pushing his Priest and dropping my other Kingpin. I swing for 1, going up to 2. Ugh. Hopefully he draws a land! But no... Mr. I-Never-Topdeck-Dead-Cards gets Fiery Temper FTW. Grrrr..... Still, that was an awesome game. Lots of crazy plays. If I'd dodged that UD, maybe I would have survived long enough to turn the tables. But I'da been down a token that I def used later so its hard to say.
5 Game Verdict:
Spoiler
Effectiveness: 3/5 Again, jsut going off match results. I had 2 really easy matches and 3 hard ones. Of the hard ones, it never felt hopelessly outmatched - to the contrary, it seemed like the tech was there to deal with whatever - I just didn't draw it in the right time. I think the most notable problem was in game 3, when I had Vehicles and no crew. Theme: 3.5/5 I'd give it a 4 but it splashed. There was a variety of arti-interactions going on here. Originality: 3/5 This one was unique, but not in a focused way like some of the others. It felt like it might have started with a concept but just evolved into a win-by-any-means kinda deck. Fun Factor: It has a big bag of tricks and I really enjoyed messing with them.
Thoughts: I agree with Maggit about the mana for this deck. It felt spot-on to me. The curve seemed good, too. I didn't mulligan once in all 5 games, tho maybe I should have in the 3rd one. My biggest issue was the 4 vehicles with scanty crew. Looking at the list I see 3 Kingpin, 3 Servo Schematics, 2 WB, and 2 Tez Touch as the early plays. 10/4 seems a little skewed. Also, Tez Touch seems like an allstar in this deck. I def think it should be running the full set. So maybe -1 Smug, +1 Touch? Colossus was a bit of a downer to draw early, too. It enables some tricks with the Key, but you only have one Key so chances are you'd be better off running just 1 Colossus. That would open a slot for something... Maybe the other Key, maybe a Filigree familiar? Or Liliana? IDK, something to tinker with, I guess.
But wait! What's this?! A new foe has appeared! Actually, it appeared quite a while ago in page 2 of this thread. oDRACARYSo posted a build after the deadline and I said I'd try to squeeze in a few games with it, too after the official entries. He didn't provide a name so I'm gonna dub it:
OhNoAZoa!
Game 1 vs Ramp-thingy (40)
Spoiler
I'm on the play with Island, Catacomb, Vial, Inspector, Rebuke, Mech Prod, and Noxious. T1. We both drop land. T2. I top Swamp, play Vial, and top another Swamp off of it. Opp plays land and TiTI. T3. I top Island, play a land and Inspector. Opp plays land and Pilgrimage. T4. I top Waterveil, play land, and Mech Prod on Vial. Opp plays land and Vegetation. T5. I top Torrential and Tradewinds (off Vial token), play land, and Noxious opps TiTI. Opp plays Baral's Exp, bouncing Noxious, Inspector, and the enchanted Vial and then freecasts Visionary off of Exp. T6. (I get a phone call which distracts me so my play is poor here). I get Kingpin and play it and Inspector again, but I play the Inspector first. Opp swings with his Visionary and I block with Kingpin. Opp Radient Flames the board clear again and plays another Visionary. T7. I get a Zoa. I play Vial, hoping for a land but get Herald instead. I play Zoa. Opp plays Nissa's Renewal. T8. I bounce Vial and draw Servo Schematic. I play Vial again, hoping for land but get Padeem instead. Then I play Schematic and swing with Zoa, leaving up mana for Rebuke, cuz he only has like 15 land in play. He must be flooding like a basement in Venice cuz he just swings with his Visionary and I trade it with my Servo. T10. I top another Vial, bounce Schematic with Zoa, and play it again, planning to Improvise Herald out, but I'm sloppy with the tapping and 2 of my 3 mana get tapped. I play the Vial, and top Return. Shrug. I swing with Zoa. At eot, I have too many cards so I drop Tradewinds. Opp does nothing. T11. I bounce Schematic again. Topdeck is land, finally. I play it, Schematic (taking care not to mistap this time) and Herald and swing for 5. Opp plays another TiTI T12. I bounce Schematic and top Zoa. Noxious comes down, clearing out his TiTI and I swing for 11 which happens to be his life total.
Game 2 vs Mardu Vehicles (40)
Spoiler
I'm on the draw with 2x Island, 2x Swamp, Kingpin, Padeem, and Torrential. T1. Opp plays Apprentice. I top Island and play a land. T2. Opp plays land and pings me with Apprentice. I top Swamp and play Kingpin. T3. Opp plays land, UD on Kingpin, and swings again. I top Island and play land. T4. Opp plays land and Depalia and swings for 1. I top Swamp and play land and Padeem. T5. Opp plays land and Flagship, burning Padeem down and swings for 5. I take. I top Rebuke and play a land. T6. Opp plays land and UD on Padeem. I Rebuke because why not. He pays the tax, burning me to 9 life. Apprentice and a Depalia buffed Flagship do the rest. My turn to flood, I guess.
Game 3 vs Boros Vehicles (39)
Spoiler
On the play with 2 Island, Swamp, Kingpin, Return, Mech Prod, and Herald. T1. I play land. He plays Goggles. T2. I top Rebuke, play land and Kingpin. He plays Smug. T3. I top Servo Schematic, play land and Schematic, leaving up mana for rebuke. Kingpin sees a Swamp which I leave there I ping him with Kingpin, leaving the Servo as a blocker. Opp plays Apprentice. I rebuke. Then he plays Weapons Trainer and swings with a 4/3 Smug. T4. I draw the land and Mech Prod Schematic. Opp plays Thopter Engineer and swings with 4/3 Smug, 2/1 thopter, and 3/2 Trainer. I chump the Trainer. T5. I Kingpin reveals 2 lands which I bottom (looking for Push) off of Schematic token. I top a land anyway and Improvise Herald onto the table, leaving my Servo token untapped (I wouldn't have mana to activate Herald regardless). Opp plays Zev's Expertise and freecasts Heart. GG.
Game 4 vs Mardu Vehicles (38)
Spoiler
Vehicles must be the flavor of the day! Getting a little sick of running against them every game. I'm on the play and mull an unplayable 2 lander (2 swamps and all spells) into 2x Island, Push, Vial, 2x Schematic, and Rebuke. T1. We both play land. T2. I top Inspector and play Schematic. Opp plays land and passes. T3. I top Catacomb, just in time. I swing with a servo and play the other Schematic, leaving up Push/Rebuke. Opp plays land and Veteran Motorist and then plays Ballista for 0 (misclick, I assume) followed by Map. I push the Motorist at eot. T4. I top another Island and play Vial, getting a Hollow and finally ping him with my tokens. He cracks his map and plays a Plains and Depalia. I Rebuke her. He Bombards one of my tokens. Fine by me. T5. I top Torrential. With Push and Rebuke in yard, it could be good, but I only have 5 land. I play Inspector, hoping it will survive a turn and swing with my remaining servo. He wastes no time Harnessing some Lightning to make my Inspector go away. T6. I'm praying for a land and... the shuffler is kind! I top Hollow and play it and peck him with the token again. Opp plays Thopter Engineer. Or tries to. I Torrential and flashcast Rebuke. He concedes.
Game 5 vs Temur Ramp (40)
Spoiler
Eeeeyyy its a full house! 2 Temurs and 3 Vehicles! This wasn't really much of a game tho so I'm just gonna cliffnotes. I keep a 4 lander on the play with Meteor, Inspector, and Waterveil as my non-lands. My first 5 draws are lands. Need I go on? Oh, ok. Well, He Rec Sages my Inspector the turn after I play it. I kill it 2 turns later with Meteor. And then Part the Waterveil the turn after that, because it was my only other non-land card. That drew me a Zoa. Yay! mini combo time! Of course, he has another Sage, so he just kills my Rock and leaves me with a pretty useless Zoa. My ONE bit of fun that game and he's all like "Nun-uh!" But what do you expect from someone who dresses up like a Jellyfish and calls himself "Opponent"? Douche. I go back to drawing lands after that and he finishes me off with Gaea's Revenge.
5 Game Verdict:
Spoiler
Effectiveness: 2/5 Zoa is a hard card to build around on account of it kinda not being very good. This was a valiant attempt and managed to score a few wins. Sure it had some help from the shuffler in that first Temur game, but it put up a legit game vs the Mardu cars in game 4. Theme: 4.5/5 On color and with artis at the core. It focused around Zoa interactions with a smidgen of Improvise. I think it could have branched into some of the other interactions we've seen a bit, too. Originality: 5/5 The only Zoa deck. Rebounding Meteors. Mechanized Servos. It was definitely different from the others. Fun Factor: Sort of... I think this was a little too ambitious about the board state it was hoping to develop. There were some fun, goofy things you could pull off, but only if everything fell into place and you didn't get much interference form the opposition.
Thoughts: Again, Zoa is just not a good card. If it were a 5/5 flyer, it would def be worth building around, but 3 toughness makes it easy enough to zap off the table, and the bounce effect can be a huge liability if your game plan gets derailed in any way. Some of the other cards also seemed a bit too weak for the deck. Tradewinds, Resourceful Return, Rebuke, and Inspector all are cards that can work with the rest of the deck, but only if you have somehow managed to create a state that wants them. In the face of opposing interaction, that is pretty hard to do, and most of the time these cards are just going to slightly slow your opponent down or sit in your hand. Better to load up on power to better increase the chances of getting where you want to be. Tezz and his Touch would be decent in here. Some more removal - be it Grasp, Murder, or possibly even a sweeper like Yahenni's (which would leave Padeem and Kingpin alive) would help. Harvesters give you a leg up vs aggro decks and can even harass enemy walkers. There are a lot of cards you could try...
Last edited by TheFlakyMage on Sat Mar 25, 2017 8:55 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Can both of those bottom two win their next two matches to catch up to Aggrofacts?? Let's see!
Btw Daring Designs having zero votes is a travesty. It would be really funny if once again that was Maggits deck.
That's funny. I liked Designs in concept and execution but still found it a bit weak on the ladder. And I didn't like Aggro-facts much at all. I still hope it comes down to Aggro-facts and Arti-fiction just cuz the names.
For me the 2 best performers over 5 games were Stuff and Smash. I'll prolly vote for one of those and then use the other vote for a deck that I liked a lot, even if it wasn't a top performer. I'll have to give it some thought tho.
Edit: also... There are ladies here? Where?! Oh... you meant laddies didn't you...? Friggin' Scottish Canadians.
Joined: Nov 10, 2013 Posts: 17752 Location: Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Oh boy both Daring Designs and Arrifiction won their fifth games to remain undefeated and are tight on the heels of sggrofacts... exciting stuff. Let's see if they can both make it back to the top shelf...
They did it! Daring Designs and Artifiction have done the impossible, they've both pulled off 6-0 records to join Aggrofacts st the very top. But there can only be two victors not three, so we enter a seventh round of playtesting to see who will fall.
Thanks to Joker for extending the deadline!
Daring Designs falls but the other two still have to win to place... Omg artifiction loses too! Aggrofacts just has to win to be the sole survivor!
In an epic duel against a rank 1 that went down to the wire, Aggrofacts is the only deck that went 7-0. Congrats to whoever the deck builder is. Key to The City saved me. I need to know how many lands on the board are necessary before you start tossing them to Key for drawing. I've been doing 7. Once I have seven land down, I'm comfortable tossing land to tap 2 to draw two cards with 5 open mana. I'd be curious if the deck builder plays it otherwise. I love this deck and hope it wins
Daring Designs and Artifiction tie for third place with 6-1 records.
Next time decklists will be public, so deckbuilders can answer any question and explain how to use their deck properly. Also nobody tried to guess the deckbuilders
I just felt like doing so would defy the purpose of my deck being amongst them; if I guessed the other decks, anyone else would know what my deck is already.
I might PM you my suspicions later.
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My decks can be found in my deckbuilder archive. Enter here!
I just felt like doing so would defy the purpose of my deck being amongst them; if I guessed the other decks, anyone else would know what my deck is already.
I might PM you my suspicions later.
I understand it. Since the deadline is tomorrow i thought people would try to guess some deckbuilders, but maybe 2 weeks of artifacts made this a bit boring.
Luckily i have a couple ideas for next round that are very spicy and janky. Compared to this ones, they make artifacts seem a tier 1 deck lol.
Joined: Nov 10, 2013 Posts: 17752 Location: Montreal, Quebec, Canada
i needed lots of time to playtest all this stuff. I'm glad we had so much time. i think the anonymous decks kill conversation in this thread cuz people can't openly talk. i think it's too heavy a price to pay for trying to prevent popularity voting which I don't think happens anyway.
to avoid popularity voting, don't make the votes for the deckbuilders or usernames. Always make them about the deck titles. that way people can't just lazily vote for people they like.
i needed lots of time to playtest all this stuff. I'm glad we had so much time. i think the anonymous decks kill conversation in this thread cuz people can't openly talk. i think it's too heavy a price to pay for trying to prevent popularity voting which I don't think happens anyway.
to avoid popularity voting, don't make the votes for the deckbuilders or usernames. Always make them about the deck titles. that way people can't just lazily vote for people they like.
I wasn't thinking about preventing popularity voting, it was only an experiment to see if the discussion could be funnier. The experiment is failed, back to public decklists
Next time decklists will be public, so deckbuilders can answer any question and explain how to use their deck properly. Also nobody tried to guess the deckbuilders
I would, but there isn't much to go on, especially since I don't have a feel for the other builders styles yet. I guessed Arti-stuff was Maggit's based on his comment about tweaking a card, but it could easily be any of them.
Joined: Nov 20, 2013 Posts: 806 Location: Bama gulf coast
Preferred Pronoun Set: SleepHmper on XBL add me
I haven't voted because I haven't been able to play all the decks, honestly I've played just a few and my attention has been else where. So far I like my deck the best out of all the ones I have played but voting for myself just seems silly. I want to play facts, Daring Designs and Colossus.
Is it wrong to vote for yourself? I have to admit I love the brewing process more than testing/playing.
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The Last Fight Club Champion
"If there can be no victory, then I will fight forever." —Koth of the Hammer
I won't vote; was too busy to playtest all of the decks. I could blindly vote 2 decks, but I dislike that.
As far as voting the own deck goes: I personally would not do that and rather vote only 1 deck. However, we can't really check it, so if you feel like it, go for it I guess.
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My decks can be found in my deckbuilder archive. Enter here!
I won't vote; was too busy to playtest all of the decks. I could blindly vote 2 decks, but I dislike that.
As far as voting the own deck goes: I personally would not do that and rather vote only 1 deck. However, we can't really check it, so if you feel like it, go for it I guess.
I would rather not vote than self vote. I'll pick my favorites outside of my deck.
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The Last Fight Club Champion
"If there can be no victory, then I will fight forever." —Koth of the Hammer
Joined: Nov 25, 2015 Posts: 1431
Preferred Pronoun Set: Xhir/xhim, depending on Moon phase
Both contest, I have liked my brew among the best 2. Still, I haven't voted my deck in any of them, I don't need to tell myself that I like my brews, I already know that.
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