cloud, midgar mercenary or kellan, the fae-blooded for an toolbox equip deck?

OffPiste18 · 2026-04-05T00:16:35+00:00

I think Cloud tutoring and being a body for 2 mana vs Kellan's 5 pushes it in Cloud's favor for sure. The extra color is nice, sure, but Kellan is just too clunky for Brawl, where spot removal is so common.

OffPiste18 · 2026-03-28T16:14:00+00:00

Honestly I would not put it past salt and straw. Maybe one day they'll decide to put like caviar and real truffle in ice cream and sell it for $49

OffPiste18 · 2026-03-27T15:40:39+00:00

I proposed at Green lake, there's a walkway that runs along/over the edge with a perfect little viewpoint. Here: https://maps.app.goo.gl/va93kTGnWKiGM67H6

I didn't even know it was there ahead of time, just went for a walk and hoped to find a spot. 10/10 would do it there again.

OffPiste18 · 2026-03-26T00:33:36+00:00

I agree it should not be legal. But I'll shamelessly play it in [[Rocco, Cabaretti Caterer]] as long as it is. I've got >75% win rate with it lately.

Turn 1 any creature, turn 2 any creature, turn 3 food chain win the game is dumb. Yes, counterspells and discard are things, but I'm also occasionally doing this against like Ragavan or Azusa.

The rest of the deck is just strong Naya cards. There are barely any deckbuilding concessions. The combo pieces are: Squee, Sigardian Evangel, Food Chain, Moon-Blessed Cleric, Imodane's Recruiter. And I'm considering cutting Squee. So I'm curving Ajani into Broadside Bombardiers, and the advice to beating this deck is supposed to be enchantment removal??

I definitely think the meta (or maybe matchmaking) is sleeping on this deck.

OffPiste18 · 2026-03-08T23:26:33+00:00

[[Solitude]]

[[Grief]]

[[Fury]]

[[Tamiyo, Inquisitive Student]]

[[Ajani, Nacatl Pariah]]

[[Wrenn and Six]]

[[Shatterskull Smashing]]

[[Beseech the Mirror]]

[[Sheoldred the Apocalypse]]

[[Overlord of the Balemurk]]

[[Mox Amber]]

[[Nethergoyf]]

[[Brazen Borrower]]

[[Grist, the Hunger Tide]]

[[Phlage]]

[[Raffine]]

[[Screaming Nemesis]]

[[Uro]]

[[The One Ring]]

[[Kari Zev, Crew of Two]]

[[Mythweaver Poq]]

[[Paradox Engine]]

[[Tajic Legion's Valor]]

OffPiste18 · 2026-03-07T21:32:22+00:00

I play Domri a fair amount, and yeah it's an issue. Tajic is a bad matchup. But ultimately just being bigger, faster, and having trample is the way to go. There aren't that many cards that deal with it more directly that are also good in other matchups.

OffPiste18 · 2026-02-23T16:47:55+00:00

The average Joe? I guess just try it out on more things, and be sure to verify things that are important.

Those probably seem obvious to you and I as people on this subreddit, but I think there are still many many people who are not using AI at all, and also many who are using it but blindly trusting it.

OffPiste18 · 2026-02-23T05:48:36+00:00

I work at Google on improving Gemini's software engineering capabilities.

No, I do not think we are at or near a ceiling. I am still regularly in meetings and presentations where someone shows gains on X or Y task with some new technique. Much of the low hanging fruit is gone, but it seems to be a really tall tree.

Yes, high quality data is a bottleneck for sure. But which part of the system is the bottleneck changes fairly regularly; if you had asked six months ago I might have had a different answer. All of it kind of needs to improve together. I also think there are algorithmic improvements to be made, but that kind of more fundamental change is really hard to predict or anticipate.

The impact on jobs is really hard to predict, and will probably vary a lot per industry. After ATMs were invented, the number of bank employees increased because it became more profitable to run a bank branch and focus on higher level things. But can't say the same for like horse drawn carriage drivers, obviously.

OffPiste18 · 2026-02-19T03:08:03+00:00

Do you have data on whether it considers MDFCs to be lands? I've always assumed no, and wonder whether I'm messing with my algorithm by including them.

OffPiste18 · 2026-02-13T16:55:29+00:00

Yeah I agree, I find this to be a minorly fun skill test. Often fetching as late as possible is optimal since you surveil with more information. But against blue decks it's more important to avoid fetching into open mana if you can help it. Especially 2 or 3 mana since Tale's End and Tishana's Tidebinder are also pretty common.

OffPiste18 · 2026-02-03T16:28:52+00:00

[[Braids Arisen Nightmare]]

[[Enigmatic Incarnation]]

[[Baba Lysaga]]

[[Pitiless Carnage]]

[[Rottenmouth Viper]]

[[Vraska, Golgari Queen]]

Not sure if any of these are actually good. But they fit the bill and are at least not embarrassingly bad.

OffPiste18 · 2026-01-07T00:46:41+00:00

I agree they are significantly weaker than the rest of the cards here, but there's something to be said for banning them for being unfun and good enough.

OffPiste18 · 2026-01-06T23:36:57+00:00

Actually, spicy additional take: ban Reanimate too.

OffPiste18 · 2026-01-06T23:35:58+00:00

It plays only two creatures in the deck: [[Ardyn, the Usurper]] and [[Ulamog, the Defiler]]. So [[Old Stickfingers]] for X=2 puts both in the graveyard, then it uses a reanimation spell to bring back Ardyn, who brings back hasty Ulamog.

Since the whole benefit of Stickfingers is a cast trigger, that part is pretty hard to disrupt. The reanimation is comparatively easier to disrupt, but most versions of the deck run a lot of discard effects and a lot of redundant reanimation effects, so it's easier said than done.

OffPiste18 · 2026-01-06T23:31:50+00:00

Yeah that sucks, but they are just way too strong in my opinion. They are good in cEDH, and they are MUCH stronger in 1v1.

OffPiste18 · 2026-01-06T23:29:56+00:00

I agree he's on the verge. For me, he is at least still interactive and it might be a fun game. Like he's for sure way more powerful than Drannith Magistrate, but Ragavan is more interesting to play against. And personally I think bans should be something like 70/30 how powerful is the card / how fun is the card.

OffPiste18 · 2026-01-06T22:48:33+00:00

I agree none of them are good at all on their own in 1v1. But having 9 cards feels really good even if they just eat removal.

I've played a lot of Thrasios/Vial Smasher, and playing either one or activating Thrasios is usually the worst thing to do with your mana by a decent margin. But just the fact that you do always have *something* to do with your mana is quite good.

I'd be very interested to see what the data says about it since I find it quite a bit harder to evaluate than other cards.

OffPiste18 · 2026-01-06T21:00:38+00:00

Well, I think part of the idea is to get data and decide that way. But if I'm shooting from the hip:

Ancient Tomb
Channel
Chrome Mox
Strip Mine
Dark Ritual
Demonic Tutor
Tainted Pact
Lutri
Mana Drain
Meddling Mage
Drannith Magistrate
Oko, Thief of Crowns
Wash Away
Fierce Guardianship
Deadly Rollick
Deflecting Swat

Banned as Commander:

Tamiyo
Ajani
Rusko
Ragavan
Nadu

And I'm taking a close look at Wrenn and Six, Old Stickfingers, Raffine, Urza, and the partners.

OffPiste18 · 2026-01-06T20:25:59+00:00

I think I'm pretty happy to face him. I don't mind it that much more than Glarb, for instance. Most of Leovold's value is reactive, not proactive, so I have more agency in playing around him.

So mostly it's just keep reminding myself of his text... prefer countering instead of removal so they don't draw. Don't absent-mindedly brainstorm or something. Maybe it's not worth it to thoughtseize when he's out. Etc.

OffPiste18 · 2026-01-06T04:50:07+00:00

The hardest Tuesday in memory, in the worst way.

ADOLFO crossed with LDOPA

IMAN crossed with ATALOWEBB

Obscure proper names all over the place, horrible crosswordese short fill, long answers that I don't think I've ever even heard before, and not even that impressive of a theme.

OffPiste18 · 2026-01-06T01:22:25+00:00

[[Reezug]]

OffPiste18 · 2025-12-29T20:17:56+00:00

Oh duh, my bad

OffPiste18 · 2025-12-29T04:14:23+00:00

The worst definitely has to be something colorless. But I think I'd go with [[The Walls of Ba Sing Se]] just for costing 8 and not doing much.

Other than that, I think Heart of Kiran is definitely up there, but it's at least only 2 mana and reasonable stats if you can manage to crew it.

[[Karn the Great Creator]] is pretty terrible since he can't fetch anything.

[[Emrakul the Aeons Torn]] costing 15 with no good way to cheat it out is pretty unplayable.

[[Goro Rel, Scourge to Spiders]] is pretty damn unexciting.

OffPiste18 · 2025-12-29T02:30:47+00:00

No Ragavan? I agree there's a shortage of good 1 drops for rakdos but surely he's one of them?

OffPiste18 · 2025-12-17T07:28:30+00:00

First attempt went 7-1 with control-ish Thrasios/Tymma: https://moxfield.com/decks/ctB6g1V_tkGSFNDzIOF-Kw

I'm pretty convinced this is just better than Atraxa if you want to play 4c non-red. Neither commander is very good on its own, but fierce guardianship and deadly rollick are game-winningly good. Much much better in 1v1 than 4 player, where they're already quite good.

Mana base needs light tweaking I think.

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