Wednesday, February 9, 2011

Mirrodin Besieged: Phyrexia

Earlier on I posted my thoughts about the Mirran faction in the new Magic: The Gathering set, Mirrodin Besieged. Now, I will post my thoughts about the Phyrexian faction.

As stated in one of my previous blogs that I was against Phyrexian cards because of infect, which I think is a very unfair mechanic. But Phyrexia made a pretty big name for itself with the release of this set. Infect cards were pretty good to begin with, but now none the infect creatures (minus a few creatures) are too over powered. For example, Phyrexian Hydra is a 7/7 with infect for 5 mana. That would be completely broken, except for the fact that whenever it is dealt damage, you add a -1/-1 counter on it for every 1 damage. Or something like Phyrexian Vatmother, which gives it controler a poison counter every upkeep. Now, an example of an over powered infect card would be Blightsteel Colossus. I talked about him in one of my earlier blogs, and I'll repeat myself when I say that an 11/11 indestructable/infect is just amazing. Thankfully though it is a high casting card. But I'm sure some people will find out a way to get Blightsteel onto the battlefield quickly.

At the pre-release, black and green infect decks were very common (who would have thought?). Beating the infect decks are very difficult, because some of them are very quick, and since you only need ten poison counters to lose, if you can't have blockers or some burn spells, then you will lose very quickly.

Final outcome: As much as I dislike Phyrexia, I believe that the will prevail over Mirran, for Phyrexia is strong, especially now with Tezzeret on their side. The new set is supposed to either be called "Mirran Pure" or "New Phyrexia." They will be coming out in May, so only time will tell who wins.

We Will Endure.

Links were made possible by www.mtgfanatic.com.

Shards of Alara: Esper

The Esper shard in the Magic: the Gathering expansion, Shards of Alara, has given new hope to artificers across the wide Multiverse. Whether or not these colored artifacts will reign supreme as did their affinity brethren before the is yet to be seen. We'll look at the incredibly diverse blue-black-white deck that promises to become an efficient fighting machine to contend with the top tier decks.


We have Treasure Hunter, Sanctum Gargoyle, and the all-powerful Sharuum the Hegemon. This means that our new deck can easily use artifacts that must be sacrificed, because we can bring them back to our hand (or in Sharuum's case, to play) with relative ease.


Some powerful cards that require sacrifices are the capsules from Shards of Alara. The black capsule allows us to destroy a nonblack creature, while the blue one will net use two extra cards in the process. The white one is the worst of the three, only allowing use to kill an artifact or enchantment. Because these capsules are so inexpensive mana-wise, we can most times return them to our hand and play them back down on the same turn.


Scourglass is another one-shot artifact that can be abused with our recursive tools. It has the potential to be a one-sided Wrath of God (assuming that we have no treasure hunters in play). Due to the slow speed of the scourglass, you should only provide one of them in an Esper deck.


The big beaters that can be put to use in this deck are Master of Etherium and Salvage Titan. These two can be brought out quickly and must be dealt with if your opponent wants to escape unscathed.


To finish off the main portion of this dekc we'll use some multipurpose cards, like esper charm, etherium sculptors, and Razormane Masticores. These are just to round out the deck and give it a bit more oomph when bringing the artificial smackdown to your opponent.

Links were made possible by www.mtgfanatic.com.

Shards of Alara: Bant

The Bant shard was one of the most interesting shards in the Magic: The Gathering expansion, Shards of Alara, and its unique exalted mechanic has a single creature bringing the pain down on your opponent.


The flagship card for the Bant shard is Stoic Angel. This heavenly creature has the potential to stave off an entire army of creatures, while whittling away at your opponent's life total each turn. The addition of the vigilance keyword is also an asset to this creature, because you can attack with two creatures each turn, as well as keeping a blocker back to guard your life total.


Once called the best card for Bant, Kitchen Finks is an advantage machine, coming back after it dies and netting you two extra life each time it hits play. This card is still an essential piece to the deck.
Rafiq of the Many is a powerhouse that can win games single handedly. The turn he comes down, he turns your strongest creature into a more powerful, double-striking menace, capable of tearing through creatures, players and planeswalkers alike.


Snakeform and Bant charm are two underused removal spells that also have extra effects. The extra card that snakeform draws you is a potential Rafiq of the many or a Stoic angel, and the sheer number of options that Bant charm gives you is simply too good to pass up. The key concept that must be stressed in this deck is utility: the ability to gain multiple effects off of fewer cards, and these two cards are prime candidates for that type of effect.


Since Bant plays many multicolored creatures, the hybrid auras from the Shadowmoor and Eventide expansions have the potential to make the player's threats even more deadly. Shield of the Oversoul can make creatures evasive and indestructible, while Favor of the Overbeing can give you that extra boost you need to finish off your opponent.


The final cards are just a couple creatures to ensure we have enough to take advantage of the exalted bonus granted by our creatures. The addition of Rhox War Monk and Akrasan Squire will do nicely for this job.

Links were made possible by www.mtgfanatic.com

Mirrodin Besieged: Mirran

In this blog, I will talk about the new set that was recently released on February 5th for Magic: The Gathering. Mirrodin Besieged was the second set in the Scars of Mirrodin block, and the climax of the battle between Mirran and Phyrexian forces. I will talk about the some of the cards from the new set from the Mirran faction.

Mirran is my personal choice of faction, but that is just because I'm not a fan of infect. In this set, Mirran has brought us a new principal. It is called Battle Cry. Battle Cry says, "Whenever a creature with battle cry attacks, all other attacking creatures you control gain +1/+0 until the end of the turn." This mechanic can help out aggro decks greatly. Also, a few other cards seem to revolve around and encourage mass-attacking. Victory's Herald for example, gives all attacking creatures flying and lifelink until the end of the turn. Mirran has also brought us a few cards to counter infect. The first card would be Sword of Feast and Famine. This doesn;t have any effects that target infect persay, but protection from green and black pretty much renders infect useless, since a good 90% of all infect cards are either black or green. Another card would be Mirran Crusader. Again, protection from black and green. Melira's Keepers has an ability which says that it cannot have counters on it, which includes infect's -1/-1 counters. And finally, Burn the Impure, which is truly anti-infect. Although these cards exist, I wish I could have seen more cards that would have downed infect a little bit more.

When I played at a pre-release event, it seemed that the common deck for a Mirran supporter was White/Red. I used this color combination and did very well against infect, because white and red bring a good control aspect to the game. I would suggest to make a White/Red deck orWhite/Green deck to counter infect (given that you are only using Mirrodin Besieged cards). Blue has been weaked a lot for Mirran, so I would not suggest making a blue deck.

Overall: Mirran made a strong attempt to go against Phyrexia, but their cards are a bit weaker compared to Scars of Mirrodin.

Links were made possible by www.mtgfanatic.com.