When did you try Rakdos Control? It's right up your alley. Not that sac/steal nonsense..

I agree that Azorious flyers isn't there (I tried it again last night actually) but the aggro deck is there.

Boros is boring? Have you seen all those trample/evasion options? Boros goes tall dawg. I think it's WAY more interesting than Boros Auras from last year, and watching my dog take a dump is more interesting than Boros Tokens was.

Why don't you like Mono Red? Do you not like extreme offense? I wasn't even suggesting mono red.. I think the Gruul Burn deck is excellent.

The last paragraph you wrote makes me sad. You stifle your own creativity (which can be near genius at times.. like the Witch-Maw Seance deck) because you're so wrapped up in.. whatever it is. Looking good, win/loss ratio, insecurity, whatever. Just let go brotha.. you might surprise yourself.

I've used Valor in Akros in my Jeskai Thopters deck (which at this point is just izzet thopters with two white cards splashed in) and I've played that deck a lot. I'm no pro by any means, but I'd like to share my experiences.

The best uses for Valor in a thopter deck that I've found are:

1) Break board stalls in mirror matches. A large part of the meta is thopters and being able to favorably attack into an opposing board full of 1/1s is key.

2) Provide alternate wincons/enchantment removal targets besides Spy Network. I've often used Valor to bait an opponent into using Rec Sage, then followed up with Spy Network. In case my Network gets removed, I can fall back on Valor to take huge chunks of the opponent's life total out of nowhere. If the rarity restrictions were removed I'd just run 4 Networks. But Duels being what it is, this is what I've found to be the next best thing.

Of course, both of these goals can be achieved by playing Flameshadow Conjuring, another do-nothing build-around 4-drop enchantment. But I'll save that discussion for another time.

I got beat by it in a Jeskai Thopters deck once. But as you pointed out, Flameshadow Conjuring works just as well and doesn't require diluting your mana base.

Flameshadow is a do-nothing but the trigger condition is easy to meet, the cost is low, and the upside is high. Not a build-around card because it's rare, but it's a solid card.

man are Tier 2 decks boring to play and boring to watch good players play. They don't scratch my itch at all. Like Bassoon said, it's just different personality sensibilities at work here, that's all.

I'm loving Mono-red this year (i have THREE different builds of it this year, but haven't been playing them lately....yet have been losing non-stop...maybe I should go back). For Boros, I have one build that's fun, it's a control build and lots of value guys. I LOVE IT. ...yet I don't play it anymore.

Anyway, I think I'm on the same page as Hakeem for this stuff.

I've been making fun of Valor for sometime now and am humiliated when I lose to it. In Magic 2015, that was Roil Elemental for me.

Comparing Valor to Sphinx (a win condition) is funny

whats funny is a much more valid comparison (based on hakeem's reason why valor is bad) would have been evolutionary leap if you draw evo leap with no cards in hand and no cards on board well you're kind of kicking yourself at that point

hell at least if you have a valor on board your second valor isn't useless, drawing an evo leap while your only other card is an evo leap on board is soul crushing

Valor would be pretty fun in a deck with Brimaz (I'd want more than just one copy of Brimaz though).

Edit: I'm bringing this up, not because we've got that card, or would get that card, but because it's the kind of card I'd want to see in order to want to run Valor. I need a card that can put some new creature into play, consistently on the turn Valor comes in to play, and after it comes into play. That card needs to be on curve with valor (e.g. 1-3 CMC), and it needs to be playable and good in the event I don't have Valor in hand.

The problem with Valor is that it wreaks your own deck's tempo. If it causes you to hold cards you should have played, so that you can get the valor effect, it slows you down, and that will ultimately cost you games in the long run.

Yeah VoA would be nice in 2015 with Rabblemaster, Brimaz or Mycoloth.

Actually mycoloth wouldn't do it for me, but yeah Rabblemaster would be another excellent fit. Point being, right now, I wouldn't play it, but who knows what we'll get in the future.

I think I'll play this deck for my channel this week. Does that appease the beast?

It does. No green or black. Yay! I'm very interested to see the results.

THE BEAST HAS SPOKEN

I wonder if I should cut those Telling Times for Twin Bolts? I do like going three-deep but more removal/burn wouldn't be bad either.

The cool thing about Telling Time is that you can dig for more Prowess triggers on the fly.. but yeah.. Twin Bolt would be excellent here too.

And you can set up the top of your library for Abbot. We'll see how it goes.

You have to play twin bolt over telling time, no question

Time will tell.

This is where bassoon says something about dad humour and Hakeem and I are momentarily reminded that we are very lucky fathers...and all is happy and well.

This is a fun little pile, Hakeem, I'm not really sold on the Djinns yet but I've only clocked a handful of games. I did pull an island for a mountain but am otherwise trying this card for card

Edit: I'd consider dropping the 5 drops to bring your curve down and allow yourself to cut some mana maybe