All posts by Darren

Why not attend an MtG Prerelease this weekend?

Uncategorized

Don’t forget that this weekend is Prerelease weekend for Magic the Gathering Dominaria. I would imagine all FLGS that sell MtG and do FNM will be running Prerelease events this weekend. I know my FLGS The Hobbit Hole are running some. They still have places on some of them, except the Saturday 11am one that is sold out (luckily I have my ticket for that already).

The Prerelease kits are good value and even more so this time because there is going to be 2 promo cards in the kits this time. Plus stores can also sell booster boxes a week early thanks to WotC. Which I suspect is them trying to get in the good graces of the FLGS again after dropping the ball on one or two recent releases (Iconic Masters, Masters 25, Explorers of Ixalan come to mind). Each booster box while stocks last comes with the sweet promo legendary creature Firesong and Sunspeaker.

Plus I think the 2 Planeswalker decks will also be available this weekend too. And if I’m not mistaken these too come with a couple of booster packs.

So if you have no plans for the weekend I’d highly recommend attending a Prerelease event.

Math Trade Update

Well the algorithm did its job and none of my offers were taken, I was offered nothing. So it was a kind of a non-event, and a bit of a let down. Will I try again? Not sure, it’s rare that I get rid of a game from my collection. And when I do it’s usually in the run up to UKGE that I do it, with collection at the expo. That way I don’t have the hassle of postage etc. So those 3 items I put in the math trade will probably go up the week before UKGE along with my Star Wars: Destiny collection. But I’ll worry about all that nearer the time.

More MtG random stuff

Uncategorized

As the observant will have noticed first versions of the dragons tribal, mono red and elves tribal Commander decks have been created and the deck lists shared on here. Plus if I remember correctly a deck list for a dinosaur tribal brawl deck has also been shared.

As a disclaimer this post and all my others are really my notes for me to refer back to. I’m nearly 50, my memory ain’t that great at this most ancient of ages and this is where I record things I want to remember. Having said that here are the things I want to remember about decks I’m building.

In very early planning stages, which basically means I have a handful at most of possible cards to use put to one side, no commander decided yet:

  • Death and Taxes deck
  • Angel deck

I’m also rebuilding the Scarab God deck. But not really spent much time on that.

Ideas I’ve had for decks include the following:

  • Wither/infect
  • Carebear
  • Abuse etb triggers
  • Saproling and fungus

Depending on how the mood takes me, one or two of the ideas could jump ahead of those that I mentioned above.

I’m not sure when I will finish those decks. I suppose it depends on how much MtG and particularly Commander I get to play after I move jobs. The two MtG Leagues I ran were well attended, and 2 Commander sessions were fairly successful around the same time. However since then I’ve tried to get a couple of sessions of Commander running but the lack of response has been disappointing. I’ve had to cancel them. Commander is my favourite format for the game. Obviously within Fenland Gamers not so much. I have a Brawl event set up for next Sunday. So that’s (and it’s not as if Magic players need it) an excuse to play with the new cards that they have just got at the Prerelease events. At the moment it’s looking like it too will be cancelled. Which is a bit disappointing. Will this push me into MtG: Arena?

I’d love to see WotC reprint in some way the Vanguard cards, and the Archenemy scheme cards. Ideally the Conspiracy conspiracies cards would also be nice (but a set of these can still be picked up easily and cheaply so less pressure on these). If WotC were clever they would do a box set that gathers these multiplayer formats altogether, print a nice little rules booklet, add in one or two multiplayer formats (see that Commandzone podcast on spicing up Commander for some of those) with some tokens to support them, like role cards for the one based on Bang!

Tribal Staples For Commander

Commander, magic, MtG, Uncategorized

I think most of you know by now a lot of the things I do are based on random finds on the internet. I’m not researching for anything, I’m just doing my normal happy go lucky stuff on the internet. And so it was while I was watching some of the regular channels on YouTube that they recommended a video by the Planeswalker Project titled “Ten Cards to Pick Up for Commander 2017“. Naturally these were cards that played on the tribal theme. So I watched the video, picked a handful and got them in.
To the cards that I got in from that list I’ve added 2 from the Ixalan block (Vanquisher’s Banner, and Radiant Destiny).

So what I present here are the cards that form my tribal staples. These are are cards that are like the Commander staples such as Sol Ring, are auto includes in any tribal deck that I build.

Here are 3 cards that although not specifically tribal, that fit really well in a tribal deck, or any deck really (colours allowing).


What are your Commander Tribal staples?

Mono Red Commander Deck

Commander, Deck tech, magic, MtG, MtG Deck Building

I listen to a podcast about Commander ( I actually listen to about 3 on this specific topic unsurprisingly) called Commanderin. There has been comments over the episodes of a mono red commander deck built by one of the hosts that they have two versions of. One with land hate and one without. Depending on the group they are playing with and the stance on mass land destruction decides on which version of the deck is played.

I liked the sound of this deck, and thought I’d build my own. I made a half hearted effort to find the deck list but didn’t find it. So I started researching red land hate cards. I had one already Blood Sun.

I also needed a win condition, so I went with some big or biggish red creatures that I could then swing in with multiple times in a turn. Yeah I have a couple of cards that gave me a second or multiple combat phases.

Eventually I did find that deck list. Surprisingly we both went with the multiple combat phases, although I think my deck is more hateful on the land front. I like the recycling of the graveyard, and discarding hands and drawing new hands. So I’ve taken that idea to use in my none hate version of the deck.

The Commander for these two mono red decks is the insane Etali, Primal Storm.

Both versions make use of the multiple attack phases on a turn.

Here are the mana curves and amc for both versions of the deck.

Let’s get to the two different versions of the deck, which you will find side by side below. Please remember these are initial versions of these decks. Particularly the none hate version. I’d like to add an Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre at some point. Plus add one or two more cards that discard cards from the opponents. I might also look at even adding more none basic lands.

Mass Land Hate None Mass Land Hate

Creatures:26

1 Fanatical Firebrand

1 Harsh Mentor

1 Kari Zev, Skyship Raider

1 Raptor Hatchling

1 Chandra, Fire of Kaladesh

1 Combat Celebrant

1 Magus of the Moon

1 Rampaging Ferocidon

1 Scalding Salamander

1 Zo-Zu the Punisher

1 Captivating Crew

1 Hazoret the Fervent

1 Needletooth Raptor

1 Purphoros, God of the Forge

1 Rekindling Phoenix

1 Charging Monstrosaur

1 Charging Tuskodon

1 Crimson Honor Guard

1 Glorybringer

1 Heartless Hidetsugu

1 Keldon Firebombers

1 Neheb, the Eternal

1 Burning Sun’s Avatar

1 Etali, Primal Storm

1 Angrath’s Marauders

1 Bearer of the Heavens

Creatures:29

1 Fanatical Firebrand

1 Harsh Mentor

1 Kari Zev, Skyship Raider

1 Narnam Cobra

1 Raptor Hatchling

1 Chandra, Fire of Kaladesh

1 Combat Celebrant

1 Magus of the Wheel

1 Rampaging Ferocidon

1 Scalding Salamander

1 Captivating Crew

1 Golden Guardian

1 Hazoret the Fervent

1 Needletooth Raptor

1 Purphoros, God of the Forge

1 Rekindling Phoenix

1 Charging Monstrosaur

1 Charging Tuskodon

1 Crimson Honor Guard

1 Glorybringer

1 Heartless Hidetsugu

1 Neheb, the Eternal

1 Burning Sun’s Avatar

1 Etali, Primal Storm

1 Hellkite Charger

1 Angrath’s Marauders

1 Tyrant of Valakut

1 Bearer of the Heavens

1 Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger

Spells:42

1 Blazing Volley

1 By Force

1 Sol Ring

1 Abrade

1 Armillary Sphere

1 Boom // Bust

1 Comet Storm

1 Crook of Condemnation

1 Dowsing Dagger

1 Lightning Greaves

1 Pyroclasm

1 Thaumatic Compass

1 Aggravated Assault

1 Blood Moon

1 Blood Sun

1 Crystal Chimes

1 Devour in Flames

1 Hazoret’s Monument

1 Insult // Injury

1 Open Fire

1 Shake the Foundations

1 Worn Powerstone

1 Blood Mist

1 Boiling Seas

1 Chandra, Torch of Defiance

1 Flame Lash

1 Flashfires

1 Hedron Archive

1 Melt Terrain

1 Nevinyrral’s Disk

1 Ruination

1 Vance’s Blasting Cannons

1 Violent Impact

1 Boulder Salvo

1 Hour of Devastation

1 Mana Geyser

1 Mass Mutiny

1 Sunbird’s Invocation

1 The Immortal Sun

1 Wake of Destruction

1 Star of Extinction

1 Obliterate

Spells:38

1 Blazing Volley

1 By Force

1 Sol Ring

1 Abrade

1 Comet Storm

1 Crook of Condemnation

1 Dowsing Dagger

1 Lightning Greaves

1 Pyroclasm

1 Thaumatic Compass

1 Thought Vessel

1 Aggravated Assault

1 Blood Sun

1 Chaos Warp

1 Crystal Chimes

1 Devour in Flames

1 Hazoret’s Monument

1 Insult // Injury

1 Mirage Mirror

1 Open Fire

1 Shake the Foundations

1 Worn Powerstone

1 Blood Mist

1 Chandra, Torch of Defiance

1 Flame Lash

1 Hedron Archive

1 Nevinyrral’s Disk

1 Past in Flames

1 Vance’s Blasting Cannons

1 Violent Impact

1 Boulder Salvo

1 Hour of Devastation

1 Mana Geyser

1 Mass Mutiny

1 Sunbird’s Invocation

1 The Immortal Sun

1 Disaster Radius

1 Star of Extinction

Lands:32

32 Mountain

Lands:33

1 Arcane Lighthouse

32 Mountain

More Epic Space Battles

Fenland Gamers, Game day

I’m going to start this post off with a clip from the most pointless sequel ever The Huntsman Winter’s War.


It’s that last few seconds where evil Queen played by Charlize Theron leans over and almost whispers “and you thought it was just a Game”. I’d like to pretend I’m a mine of movie clips and quotes for all occasions , but sadly I’m not. I just happened to be watching this first thing over my coffee and chocolate chip brioche, and thought “oh how appropriate, that sums up TI:4”.

We were due to start playing at 10:30. So to cut down on the prep and let us start playing as quickly as possible I got to The White Lion early to set up. The official FFG 20th anniversary 3ft by 3ft playmat looks awesome.

Despite starting at 10:28 to go through the selecting of races, setting up the tiles of our galaxy, placing initial forces, choosing our initial secret objective and other game play set up steps, which did include a brief how to play for our new player, the process still took 40 minutes. A very brief break for the usual refreshments, bodily movements, and nicotine hits for those that needed them, then saw our empires start competing for glory and power.


For a long time the game was fairly peaceful, no battles. Just some trading, swapping promissory notes, etc. Our galactic empires expanded, planets grabbed, borders established. But the expansionist ambitions of Jeff with his 2 war suns was starting to become a big threat on the board. Somehow I managed to grab Mecatol Rex and hold on to it. If only I’d been able to pull off the same stunt with my home worlds against Jeff. The fall of my home planets gave Jeff 2 of the 3 final victory points he needed to grab the win when it came to claiming the open objectives. A completed secret objective was the third.

So since getting Twilight Imperium 4th Edition last year, this is the third time I’ve played it. Which isn’t bad considering the share scale of the game. But the more important fact is Jeff has won all 3 games. Although I seem to be improving because I got a score of 7 this time. My highest score so far.

We had a great day playing TI:4, and what I still find amazing is despite it taking a long time to play, it just doesn’t seem that long, and time flies. It like you start playing in the morning and then the next thing you know it’s the evening. Time travel folks.

Can’t wait to play Xia next and then to organise the next session for TI:4.

Elf Tribal Commander Deck

Commander, Deck tech, magic, MtG, MtG Deck Building

The basis for this deck is the 2014 and Commander Anthology Guided by Nature Commander Deck. I was going to create an Elf Tribal deck from scratch, but after playing the mentioned deck there were a lot of cards that I’d want for my deck. So I bought a secondhand copy of Guided by Nature to change. Why reinvent the wheel, or most of it?

Like my other tribal decks there are some staples I’m now including in all my tribal decks. This Elf deck particularly generates lots of 1/1 token creatures. These are particularly vulnerable to cards like Blazing Volley, Scalding Salamander, or XXX, that can clear the battlefield of tokens and small creatures. These tribal cards amongst other things buff up my creatures protecting them from such cards. I think the last piece to my jigsaw will be to find an affordable (ie cheap) card that gives all my creatures indestructible.

The game plan for this deck is simple. It goes wide really fast. But the idea isn’t to really to swing in with lots of little creatures. Elf decks exploit this numerical advantage in other ways, like generating lots of mana, life, or buffing a creature. With the tribal cards that swing in with lots of not so small creatures is an option. But in reality it will be swinging in with one or two pumped up creatures.

Freyalise, Llanowar’s Fury will remain the Commander for this deck. Her +2 loyalty ability is what we are really after. Getting a 1/1 Elf Druid token that taps for mana. Ramp, and spamming the board with elves perfect. Her -2 loyalty ability is also pretty handy too. It’s there but not sure I’d use the ultimate. Plus I think the ultimate isn’t very threatening. Her +2 is the dangerous ability, and why opponents will target her.

I’ve played around with the decks mana base. Changed one or two of the non basic lands, and reduced the number of basic lands from 25 to 16! Which means I’m playing 28 lands in total. But with a Growing Rites of Itlimoc, a couple of mana rocks, elves that tap for mana I don’t think mana is going to be an issue. Plus there are a fair few cards in the deck that allow me to go search for a land.

Here is the deck list.

Counts : 100 main

Creatures:37

1 Boreal Druid
1 Elvish Mystic
1 Elvish Skysweeper
1 Essence Warden
1 Ezuri’s Archers
1 Joraga Warcaller
1 Llanowar Elves
1 Druid of the Cowl
1 Elvish Vanguard
1 Elvish Visionary
1 Leaf Gilder
1 Priest of Titania
1 Sylvan Ranger
1 Steel Leaf Champion
1 Thornweald Archer
1 Wellwisher
1 Adaptive Automaton
1 Elvish Archdruid
1 Elvish Branchbender
1 Ezuri, Renegade Leader
1 Farhaven Elf
1 Imperious Perfect
1 Lifespring Druid
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Timberwatch Elf
1 Titania’s Chosen
1 Drove of Elves
1 Dwynen, Gilt-Leaf Daen
1 Immaculate Magistrate
1 Ivy Lane Denizen
1 Lys Alana Huntmaster
1 Masked Admirers
1 Wild Wanderer
1 Wildheart Invoker
1 Yeva, Nature’s Herald
1 Tajuru Pathwarden
1 Elegant Edgecrafters
1 Gladehart Cavalry

Spells:34

1 Glaring Spotlight
1 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Silent Gravestone
1 Sol Ring
1 Stoneforge Masterwork
1 Emerald Medallion
1 Land Grant
1 Lightning Greaves
1 Lull
1 Moss Diamond
1 Steely Resolve
1 Thought Vessel
1 Beastmaster Ascension
1 Commander’s Sphere
1 Growing Rites of Itlimoc
1 Herald’s Horn
1 Nissa’s Pilgrimage
1 Presence of Gond
1 Pulse of Murasa
1 Root Out
1 Hunting Triad
1 Whirlwind
1 Coat of Arms
1 Freyalise, Llanowar’s Fury
1 Overwhelming Stampede
1 Predator, Flagship
1 Vanquisher’s Banner
1 Desert Twister
1 Grim Flowering
1 Obelisk of Urd
1 The Immortal Sun
1 Wave of Vitriol
1 Zendikar Resurgent
1 Praetor’s Counsel

Lands:28

1 Arcane Lighthouse
1 Evolving Wilds
16 Forest
1 Haunted Fengraf
1 Havenwood Battleground
1 Jungle Basin
1 Myriad Landscape
1 Oran-Rief, the Vastwood
1 Path of Ancestry
1 Scavenger Grounds
1 Slippery Karst
1 Terramorphic Expanse
1 Tranquil Thicket

MtG Dominaria Open House This Weekend

magic, MtG


This weekend your FLGS will be holding Open House events for MtG. I believe my FLGS The Hobbit Hole are holding theirs on Saturday. These are regular events throughout the year aimed at new and returning players to MtG.

You turn up at your FLGS, get a free Welcome deck, an experienced MtG player teaches you how to play. Once you are happy with how to play MtG, you then play 2 or 3 games solo against other new players. Once you have played those games you get a rather sweet full art Llanowar Elves promo card from the new Dominaria set.


If you are feeling brave after attending there is naturally the weekly Friday Night Magic that are held at your FLGS. You may want to buy one of the new Challenger decks for this if they are playing Standard. If they are doing a sealed or draft event you won’t need anything extra, you use the booster packs that your entry fee covers to build a deck. These can be a bit daunting, but those weird, scruffy looking guys don’t bite, and will gladly help and give advice.

However next weekend is the Prerelease weekend for the new set Dominaria. This means you get to play with the new cards a week early. They are fun things to attend, and the cost covers a Prerelease kit, 3 rounds of playing Magic, and 2 participation booster packs. So for your entry fee you get 8 boosters packs from the new set, a foil promo card, and a life count down die. Which is pretty good value.

Then the following weekend it’s the actual release weekend when the new set officially goes on sale. Your FLGS will most likely be doing drafts with the new cards that weekend.

If you are interested in learning to play this weekend is a great jumping off point. Hope you can get to a store and get that sweet promo card. I’ll be jealous I’m playing TI:4 instead so won’t get one.

Some random stuff

magic, MtG

One of my students has recently been given entry into the closed beta for MtG Arena. His main complaint about the game is due to him! His pc is not powerful enough at times during the game. Those times are when certain animations occur. Otherwise I believe he’s fairly happy with the actual game play.

For me Arena is dead to me until I can play it in my iPad. They could be testing it on iPad during this closed beta. For starters WotC are developing Arena in Unity. Which means they can export the game for whatever platform they like basically. No reason not to see a console version either. If White Wizard Games can do a closed Kickstarter backers alpha testing of Epic on PC/iOS/Android, and I bet they have less resources than WotC on this, then why can’t WotC with Arena? TestFlight on iOS allows this.

Because of the above Arena isn’t on my radar and wasn’t a consideration when I heard about Brawl. But since then some online have pointed out that one of the reasons Brawl may have been developed was for Arena. Commander is one, if not the most popular formats for MtG. Sadly Arena will not be able to play it due to the share number of cards that are legal in the format (thousands). So with Brawl only using the cards from Standard, and those are the cards available in Arena. The conspiracy theory is that this is why WotC invented Brawl, to add Commander like play to Arena. I certainly can see how this sounds credible. It’s also been pointed out in a podcast that Brawl in Arena may only be a 1 v 1 format, because they can’t see how the multiplayer element and board states would be handled.

For me I don’t want to have to grind to be able to do anything, like deck build.

Math Trade Update

A brief update on the UK Math Trade I’m taking part in. The list is now closed for adding games. It’s now entered the phase where people have until tomorrow I think it is to submit their want lists. This is basically you selecting the games you’d like to trade for and what you are offering from the games you put on the list.

I’ve submitted my want list.

It’s up to the software they run next to make the match ups. The Rebellion expansion I’m using as a wild card and see if I get offered anything of interest for it.

Dragon Tribal Commander Deck

Deck tech, magic, MtG, MtG Deck Building

Last August WotC scored a home run with their tribal Commander decks. I know I’ve upgraded the Wizards deck first, but it’s the dragons everyone wants to play in reality. A bit like when Ixalan came out, dinosaurs were the real stars. And yes I wanted to upgrade the dragon deck. So my starting off point for this deck was that $20 upgrade from the same source as the Arcane Wizardry one I did. That worked really well, although I did deviate for that one also for a couple of cards. Like the wizards mtgoldfish give you a couple of ways to take the deck. I went with the only real one to play with dragons. I went big instead of wide.

The cards from the suggested upgrade list are being kept to one side in a little card holder so I can easily play with that version of the deck if I so wish.

For some reason I don’t have a Dragonlord Atarka. Which is part of the upgrade list in that article. Yes I have one on the way now. However in the meantime it leaves the deck a card short. So at the moment I’m trying it with the Nicol Bolas Elder Dragon Legend. But I’m also thinking Glorybringer might be a nice card in that slot too. So at some point I might try it with that also.

Anyway my main deviations are tribal cards, such as Adaptive Automaton, Vanquisher’s Banner and Coat of Arms. There are a few scattered in this deck. So my dragons get even bigger.

Naturally my Commander is The Ur-Dragon. The eminence ability alone makes it worth while. 1 discount on casting other dragons isn’t to be sniffed at.


Tactically this is a swing in with big dudes deck. Which if you hit the cards are pumped up even bigger. All the creatures apart from being big hitters also have some sort of ability that benefits us. That might be when they enter the battlefield, attack or die. Either way whatever is triggered is good for us. Although Deathbringer Regent does have to be timed so he’s not also taking out our own creatures. Otherwise it’s a board wipe leaving us with a 5/6 on the board with nothing to block it, especially if it has been given haste.

Here is the all important deck list…

Counts : 100 main

Creatures:28

1 Dragonlord’s Servant
1 Adaptive Automaton
1 Dragonspeaker Shaman
1 Boneyard Scourge
1 Dromoka, the Eternal
1 Kolaghan, the Storm’s Fury
1 Scalelord Reckoner
1 Scion of the Ur-Dragon
1 Scourge of Valkas
1 Sunscorch Regent
1 Wasitora, Nekoru Queen
1 Broodmate Dragon
1 Crosis, the Purger
1 Hellkite Charger
1 Hellkite Tyrant
1 Niv-Mizzet, Dracogenius
1 Ryusei, the Falling Star
1 Savage Ventmaw
1 Silumgar, the Drifting Death
1 Steel Hellkite
1 Teneb, the Harvester
1 Atarka, World Render
1 Bladewing the Risen
1 Deathbringer Regent
1 Ojutai, Soul of Winter
1 Nicol Bolas
1 Utvara Hellkite
1 The Ur-Dragon

Spells:33

1 Earthquake
1 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Sol Ring
1 Dragon Tempest
1 Farseek
1 Helm of Awakening
1 Rampant Growth
1 Seek the Wilds
1 Steely Resolve
1 Anguished Unmaking
1 Commander’s Sphere
1 Cultivate
1 Darksteel Ingot
1 Descendants’ Path
1 Elemental Bond
1 Growing Rites of Itlimoc
1 Herald’s Horn
1 Kodama’s Reach
1 Temur Ascendancy
1 Crucible of Fire
1 Frontier Siege
1 Syphon Mind
1 Utter End
1 Whip of Erebos
1 Coat of Arms
1 Crux of Fate
1 Gravitational Shift
1 Kindred Discovery
1 Palace Siege
1 Unburial Rites
1 Vanquisher’s Banner
1 Obelisk of Urd
1 The Immortal Sun

Lands:39

1 Arcane Lighthouse
1 Arcane Sanctum
1 Command Tower
1 Crucible of the Spirit Dragon
1 Crumbling Necropolis
1 Exotic Orchard
3 Forest
1 Frontier Bivouac
1 Haven of the Spirit Dragon
3 Island
1 Jungle Shrine
6 Mountain
1 Mystic Monastery
1 Nomad Outpost
1 Opulent Palace
1 Path of Ancestry
3 Plains
1 Sandsteppe Citadel
1 Savage Lands
1 Seaside Citadel
3 Swamp
1 Vivid Crag
1 Vivid Creek
1 Vivid Grove
1 Vivid Marsh
1 Vivid Meadow