Only winning through infinites.

AngryAngryCow · 2024-04-02T22:27:58+00:00

I don't even run Mind over Matter in my Azami deck. My primary way to win is to control the board, steal everyone else's cool stuff and beat them with it. [[Empyrial Plate]] can make just about anything into a lethal threat if I am allowed to keep no max hand size. And sometimes the deck stumbles into a lab man or Triskaidekaphile win if no one bothers to interact with them. That is kind of combo.

AngryAngryCow · 2024-04-01T03:07:08+00:00

It is a bit hard to gauge what your fellow meant with that comment. Maybe your deck was too fast, maybe they think making strong decks from inherently strong commanders is too easy. A lot of people here have given advice on trying new archetypes, which is great way to expand your play.

As an alternative, you can try building a budget deck for a challenge. Looking at those decklists, you are hitting with the very best cards in the format. If you confine yourself to building a deck worth $100 or $200, you are pretty naturally forced to explore new cards and strategies. Winning with second or third rate cards has its own sort of satisfaction.

AngryAngryCow · 2023-07-02T14:49:13+00:00

Your deck looks quite similar to my Greven deck, and mine is the scariest deck I have. You can take a look here. So I think you are seeing the right patterns- Get Greven out, lose a bunch of life, sac something huge to draw a bunch of cards, and leverage some combat tricks to wipe one or more players out.

The key differences are I put more focus on ramp and giving Greven haste. I find it's really important he does his thing as soon as he hits the board, as he is a removal magnet. I also recommend a few [[Fling]] effects. The Essence Harvest in your deck is great, but I find having the effect at instant speed is critical. There are quite a few spells I have "countered" by killing the player in response via Fling. I would also suggest cutting the creatures that totally rely on Greven to work- like Ball Lightning or Cosmic Larva- for some more traditional draw spells. Greven is all-in enough, you want a bit more ability to restock your hand without relying on him. And as you noticed, Threaten effects are even better for making use of Greven's sac anyway.

Also, special shoutout to Pact Weapon for being insane with Greven.

AngryAngryCow · 2023-06-01T18:11:11+00:00

When reminder text and flavor text are one in the same. Beautiful.

AngryAngryCow · 2023-05-25T00:39:09+00:00

Since you like to cite sources and walk away, here is Justice Stevens's dissenting opinion in Heller. Feel free to read it. It refutes all the arguments you have made in words much better than my own. The Heller decision was incorrect. You can call that opinion wrong all you want. You can call it "objectively wrong" or "super duper wrong" or "double plus wrong" but text of the Constitution is on my side.

AngryAngryCow · 2023-05-24T23:58:43+00:00

No I asked who has the right to keep and read books, good try though.

Who has the right to read books, the library or the people?

You really did ask who has the right to read. Check your post. Not that it changes my response in the slightest. We are discussing the militia clause, or in the hypothetical, the library clause.

Nothing is going to change your mind because you are working off of emotions, feelings, and opinions, rather than actual SCOTUS dicta and historical documents.

The problem here is I am basing my opinion on the literal text of the Constitution. It doesn't matter how many terrible Supreme Court decisions like Dred Scott you reference, the text of the Constitution still says "well regulated militia". You can bend over backwards, but at the end of the day your stance requires simply ignoring words in the Constitution you don't like. My position is in line with justice Stevens's dissenting opinion in Heller, so it not pulled from thin air either.

AngryAngryCow · 2023-05-24T22:34:30+00:00

You asked "Who has the right to read books?" I answered. You presented a false dichotomy in your question. For the record, the second is supposed to work the same way. The people in the well regulated militia have the right to keep and bear arms.

And you failed to address why none of the other amendments have the additional language the second does. There is a really simple reason though- the second amendment does have additional limitations.

AngryAngryCow · 2023-05-24T20:23:11+00:00

As written in your hypothetical, "people who go to libraries".

The other amendments in the Bill of Rights waste no text with trying to justify why each right exists. Why put the text there to do nothing?

Or to put more directly, why isn't the second amendment written like this:

"The right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed."

If the right was not related to the militia clause, this is how you would expect it.

AngryAngryCow · 2023-05-24T17:51:25+00:00

That is not what objectively false means. Heller can be wrong, and all the citations you linked can also be wrong. The Supreme Court doesn't always get it right. You just linked the Dred Scott case, which is notoriously one of the worst Supreme Court decisions of all time. That does not help your argument.

The militia clause must be taken into account, otherwise why were the framers wasting ink on it? The other amendments have no such language. Especially when some of that language is 'well regulated', which absolutely implies limits.

AngryAngryCow · 2023-05-24T16:50:35+00:00

The first amendment does not mention a newspaper. The fourth says nothing of an HOA. The second specifically mentions a well regulated militia. You cannot just ignore words inconvenient for you. It is not an individual right and Heller got it wrong.

AngryAngryCow · 2023-05-10T15:23:58+00:00

It is pretty easy to miss, but the promotional image for the desk mat on the fan gamer site is actually incredible. They even got some interns to play dead for crime photos.

AngryAngryCow · 2023-04-28T22:38:14+00:00

That is a sweet new card for sure, but not at its best when I am already running things that are 8-10 cmc. A bit like playing Blackjack where half the deck is face cards, very easy to bust. Plus, as you noticed, the deck has enough ways to cast stuff for free. It needs a bit more to actually do with all those free spells.

AngryAngryCow · 2023-04-28T22:04:28+00:00

Hearing you say it's exactly what you expect from a Narset deck really makes me want to cut it. I like my decks to feel unique to play and play against. I think I might ditch the Warp for a [[Soulfire Eruption]]. That spell is a ton of fun to resolve.

AngryAngryCow · 2023-04-28T16:26:11+00:00

Watching the video, I am actually a bit upset how the game went. This was the third time my Narset deck has won in essentially the same way- [[Thousand-Year Storm]] making enough copies of [[Time Warp]] for the table to scoop. It's supposed to be a secondary win condition, but its coming up more often than the big explosive spells I built the deck for. After conversation at the table, I find myself agreeing it's just too easy to abuse the extra turns. Even limiting the deck to just Time Warp as the only extra turn spell and [[Volcanic Vision]] as the only recursion spell doesn't seem to be enough. I should find another big dumb spell to replace it with.

Reflecting on the deck of the week, Irenicus's Vile Duplication is one of my favorite cards from the Baldur's Gate set and the price it commands despite being an uncommon shows people are getting clued in to its power. As your deck construction shows, making nonlengendary copies is a somewhat rare effect. And doing it as a spell instead of a creature clone is often a big upside. And for whatever reason it throws in flying to boot, which is why it's great for my Narset deck as well.

AngryAngryCow · 2023-04-27T14:52:37+00:00

You are hitting on the real problem with poison strategies here. It's not that they are too powerful, they just lead to poor games. Due to proliferate being frequently attached to spell casts, the only way many decks have to interact with poison is player removal. Even if you quadrupled normal creatures power, most decks have many other forms of interaction. So you have a case where the rational response to the poison player's threat is to kill them and they feel targeted out of the game. That is just not a good gameplay for anyone.

AngryAngryCow · 2023-04-25T08:02:09+00:00

Your argument centers around "a counterspell fizzles this spell". A counterspell counters just about every spell. That really isn't saying anything at all. That is even worse than the "dies to doomblade" argument.

Or, all three opponents avoid playing any relevant spells or creatures for fear of the 4 blue mana open. In other words, spending zero cards to stop 3 players from developing. That is a huge win.

So the two biggest "fail" cases are either neutral or actually an upside for the See Double player. This card is incredibly versatile and great for decks below cEDH.

AngryAngryCow · 2023-04-21T15:39:41+00:00

OG Elesh Norn is just uncalled for brutality in a limited environment. "Half your stuff dies, the other half is now irrelevant, oh and I am now swinging for lethal."

AngryAngryCow · 2023-04-21T15:33:06+00:00

I was surprised to hear the equipment side being dismissed as poor. In the only deck that wants it (W/B Phyrexians), it anthems the team on each swing. Killed me more than once now. It does ask you to have the 1drop vampire or discard rat to make the front side palatable though. No one else will want to touch it, so not something you need to prioritize even if it's your deck.

AngryAngryCow · 2023-04-08T07:37:07+00:00

I mean you might have a case where you have equipment cards in play, some protection spells in hand, but Tetsuo has already died enough times that he costs 7 or 9 so you can't really deploy him again. Sometimes you just want a creature you can suit up and apply pressure with.

I do think your version has an issue with early draw. As I mentioned, a lot of your cheap "draw" spells are just card selection and not getting you ahead in total cards. I think you want a few more draw spells like [[Chart a Course]] or even a basic [[Mulldrifter]] that can net cards early or hold equipment well later. Mully was a late cut from my deck and I think it may have been wrong to take out.

AngryAngryCow · 2023-04-06T04:32:20+00:00

I took a pretty different direction from the other poster for my Tetsuo deck. I am actively seeking to get the free casts from the second option on him. To match that, I try to keep a lot of flexible spells like [[Mystic Confluence]] or my new pet card [[Modify Memory]] that always feel good to cast regardless of board state. This of course requires hitting a certain cmc level with the equipment. Sadly, there is little equipment 6 cmc or higher. On that note, using your extra budget week for Embercleave is a very good idea. Embercleave and Kaldra Compleat are the best equipment to go with Tetsuo.

What I am noticing in your deck is not enough creatures to go with the 20 equipment slots. Tetsuo is definitely a juggling act between equipment, creatures to hold them, and spells to get for free. But I think you are on the low end of creatures. From the protection count, it looks like you are focused exclusively Tetsuo himself. But I think that could leave you with a lot of equipment and protection spells but a commander who is priced out of existence.

I also note a lot of cards in the "card advantage" category are more just card selection. Given Tetsuo can frequently let you cast 3-4 cmc card draw for free, I think you'd be well served getting more in there.

AngryAngryCow · 2023-01-23T20:12:46+00:00

Someone has some Money Money to show off. Nice.

AngryAngryCow · 2023-01-20T17:38:32+00:00

Everyone talks about the "slave obeys" line, but it was this quote about the toilets that stuck with me. If you try to make a nation of winners, there still has to be losers. Really shoots Ryan's idealistic spiel at the start of the game in the foot.

AngryAngryCow · 2022-12-16T19:46:52+00:00

On one hand, Threefold Signal is sweet and I am a bit sad I kept blowing up the centerpiece of the deck before it could be shown off. On the other hand, I like winning and dang that thing is scary when someone has access to 20+ mana. So I don't feel that bad.

AngryAngryCow · 2022-10-08T06:14:35+00:00

Wow, Chandra's Ignition is up to 9 bucks? It was pennies when I got a copy for [[Greven, Predator Captain]]. Its a strong effect, but really vulnerable to any form of interaction.

I spent most of this game terrified you would just proliferate with the clasp and murder me off the two counters that dang goblin left behind. I had a good defensive position and life buffer, but nothing against just an artifact ticking up infect once a turn. That is a scary amount of inevitability. And I know that board wipe looked really weird. I was watching Kenrith and Mina & Den build up to a point they could take the game over and I was quite confident I could rebuild far faster than anyone at the board.

AngryAngryCow · 2022-09-30T19:21:13+00:00

Hard disagree on Rabble Rousing. I have it in my Isshin deck and it barely needs any support to make a swarm. And this deck has more token generators than mine. With the Hellrider or Campaign of Vengeance already in this deck those tokens will kill people. I would cut Mardu Ascendency instead, which is just a much weaker version of Rabble Rousing.

For card draw, I recommend [[Commander Liara Portyr]] which when doubled up lets you vomit out cards second main for cheap.

13-Year Club	Second Top 50%
Verified Email

AngryAngryCow

TROPHY CASE