u/binaryeye

Well, technically...

Worth noting that at this time, the only thing "starter" about starter decks was that they came with a rulebook. Otherwise, they were essentially 60-card boosters with half as many rares relative to the number of cards.

I think the first starter set with pre-made decks was the Rivals Quick Start Set, released in 1996.

Something similar may have been in starter products later, but this was a separate product. It was released about the same time as Revised and had a list price of $7.95, the same as a starter deck.

Also, the whole thing isn't rules. The rules section is 70 pages, or just under a third of the book. The rest is card errata, tips on deckbuilding, the creation of the game, alternate ways to play (e.g. multiplayer), and a checklist for Limited Edition.

Ingris and Master of Barbs are basically tailor-made for BR Lizards. This is what I've been running in Bo1:

4 Hired Claw
4 Iridescent Vinelasher
4 Flamecache Gecko
2 Gastal Thrillseeker
3 Gev, Scaled Scorch
4 Magebane Lizard
4 Master of Barbs
3 Ingris Stingerquill
3 Valley Flamecaller

4 Burst Lightning
2 Stingerquill Charm

8 Mountain
4 Swamp
4 Blazemire Verge
4 Blood Crypt
3 Cavern of Souls

Thanks so much for reviewing the draft in such detail. This is a ton of help.

As a learning exercise, where did you feel u/B was more of the lane than u/W?

Basically everything up to P2P4. There hadn't been any very good white cards passed in pack one, there was a Theorix Charm P1P8, and I already had a few good cards in UB. So even when I picked the Denzilore, my mind was in the context of UB splashing white, when I should have re-framed to U splashing whatever else was good.

P2P4 Is where you need to say, this got passed to me, literally no one to my left is playing u/W. This is a bomb, go wide card.

I kind of struggle knowing whether to take things like this as a signal. Is there a threshold here? For example, would the same be true if it had been passed P2P2, which indicates only one person isn't in WU?

P2P5 Is your first "what were they thinking" Desperate Futurescribe + Fatehold is going to go crazy. This is your second PLASE MOVE INTO u/W signal. Im curious to your mindset here.

I think my mindset was I was still splashing white and turn four was too early to consistently find a white source. Stupid in retrospect, of course.

P3P1: If you dont answer any other question, I need to know what the mindset here was because this absolutely killed your draft.

From halfway through pack two, I had a bit of tunnel vision for fixing and removal. I wanted to make sure I had enough fixing to support Denzilore, and at that point I had only one landcycler and the Volume.

I had reviewed the games but didn't see these things (which is why I posted this; I wasn't asking about just the draft). Thanks for taking the time to look at them.

Game 1 you took surgical precision over their last threat with null summoner which does not make sense, surgical has no targets on board and you're fine with them cycling it.

Yeah, this was pretty bad. For some reason, I was thinking Surgical Precision was like Repel Calamity (power or toughness) and could hit the Summoner.

On game 2 you just, didn't cast solve for disappointment on turn 2?

Well, I was holding up Last Gasp because I had no creatures in hand and didn't want to get behind on board. I can see that it makes more sense to be proactive here.

Then you cast it on turn 4 instead of just running out summoner. They already played a counter, just jam summoner there.

I guess I saw it as both doing essentially the same thing, with Solve being more mana efficient so I could hold up Last Gasp. I also wanted the surveil from Solve. Definitely see that I should have taken the Oculus with Summoner, though. They were stuck on two mana and the Hydra wasn't going to help with that.

Thanks for the feedback.

Looks like you really liked your P1 P1 and refused to settle into a very obvious U/W lane splashing black.

I was trying to stay open in pack one but after P1P3 didn't see anything that pulled me in a clear direction away from my first two picks, so just stuck with that. I mulled over picking Violent Echoes until the timer hit a few seconds and just picked the Keeper out of indecision.

I can recognize that I should have picked Futurescribe P2P6 and Proctor P3P1. But beyond that, what makes WU such an obvious lane (not rhetorical, I genuinely don't know)? Is it P2P4 Denzilore? To me, that just says the three people to my left aren't in WU, but maybe that's the wrong way to interpret it. P2P6 Futurescribe?

I think what I've learned is that I was framing my picks in the wrong context (UB with white splash) and need to constantly evaluate the context in which I make picks.

After a rough start in this format, I thought I was at least improving, with four 5-3s over my last five drafts. Then this happens and I'm wondering if I'm fundamentally approaching things the wrong way.

In retrospect, I definitely would have made a few different picks during the draft. Specifically P3P1; I went with the landcycler there because at that point I had only Volume, one Witness, and a dual to fix for white.

In terms of the game's rarity, it's a "common" card. But since it's from the first printing of the game (released in August 1993), and the print run was very small, it's relatively rare in general terms. There were less than 16,000 of this specific card printed.

The token is still returned to hand, it just ceases to exist once it gets there.

How many cards have two? Is this the first?

Looks like Mine, Mine, Mine! was the first. Fear, Fire, Foes! outside of silver border.

This is Arena Bo1 draft. The best players have a win rate in the 65% to 70% range and the average 17Lands user has a win rate of about 55%. 53% isn't necessarily bad, but it definitely isn't "really good".

It's clear from the draft and game logs that there's room for improvement in all phases; draft, deckbuilding, and gameplay. FRA is a somewhat soupy format, but this is just a greedy pile of cards asking to lose.

Well, there's part of the problem. What makes you think you need a 4-drop? You can just as well play a 2-drop and hold up Last Gasp on turn four, or hold up Last Gasp and cycle for a land, or hold up Extended Absence, etc.

Commander is an absolutely terrible multiplayer game and nobody has been able to prove that statement wrong.

I personally agree it isn't a good multiplayer game. But it's a game, so whether or not it's enjoyable is completely subjective. The statement can't be proven one way or the other.

And really, it doesn't much matter if it's a good game. It's a social experience that doesn't require one to be social to participate, while being an outlet for creativity and self-expression. The average tabletop game might be vastly better for multiplayer from a design standpoint, but it can't provide the sense of identity and ownership that playing a Commander deck does.

topline momentum, favorable mix and cost productivity

For anyone who isn't a corporate executive, this apparently translates to sustained increase in revenue, high-margin products, and profit.

Presumably for errata to their creature types to better match their names (detective and monkey).

You mean skip playing a card, right? For the first few years, both players drew a card on the first turn, so it was guaranteed you'd be able to discard down to seven on turn one.

The short answer is that most formats in Bo1 are fine for 16 lands. Sierko, host of Magic Numbers, ran the 17lands data on several play booster sets and found basically the same win rate for 16 land and 17 land decks (numerically higher for 16 lands).

Not sure if the "short answer" is Sierkovitz's conclusion or your own, but the data doesn't support it at all. Comparing the win rates of decks only indicates that those built to run 16 lands performed better than those built to run 17 lands.

Honestly, I don't think it fits the trope at all. The story starts with Morgon as a prince that has recently finished studying at the college of riddle-masters. He certainly isn't a farmboy.

That's different, though, because an opponent targeting your hexproof creature is an illegal action. I'm not a judge, but I'm fairly sure rewinding the game state is the preferred remedy to that situation.

Refusing to accommodate a player that feels it's okay to rewind combat once they know you've got a combat-altering card in hand doesn't seem all that "sweaty" to me. That's just straight up asking to cheat. If you're not playing by the rules of the game, what's the point of playing the game?

Especially Standard - sure more sets are included than ever but barely any of those cards are actually played.

Huh? Looking at the top eight Standard decks on MTGGoldfish, there are 45 different cards played maindeck from sets released this year. Eight of those are reprinted lands made legal by ECL, SOS, or FRA, but that still leaves 37. I don't see how that qualifies as "barely any". Even if looking at this from a "staples" perspective, just over 25% of the cards on the top 50 creatures/spells lists are from sets released this year.

Musician, I assume.

So does Wall of Bone make this UW?