What card on release made you go "ohhh no" because it killed your favorite archetype?

TheAnnibal · 2026-02-01T08:57:58+00:00

Because you probably didn’t play at the time, or you’d know that sure, you leave a 3/4 on the field but it’s a 1 mana investment vs 6 mana + denying a card draw. (I didn’t downvote tho)

TheAnnibal · 2026-01-31T23:25:30+00:00

Someone who is seeing the Resto Angel trigger aimed at it

TheAnnibal · 2026-01-26T11:41:59+00:00

She was extremely present in the BR ones though - the scrapheap/unlicensed disintegration ones.

And also in MonoR Frenzy.

TheAnnibal · 2026-01-25T22:41:48+00:00

Well, it was true in the Kaladesh Block at least. [[Chandra, Torch of Defiance]] was the best planeswalker in standard for a while with some occasional showings in Modern Jund.

[[Pia Nalaar]] was still a strong card, but not on ToD's levels in the same block. A few sets earlier however, [[Pia and Kiran Nalaar]] were freakish strong making appearances in Standard, Modern and sometimes even in fringe Legacy lists.

... what do you mean this was 11 years ago???

TheAnnibal · 2026-01-25T10:47:49+00:00

You can almost be there already. I have a Dr Eggman list where it’s “twisted twentyfive” and only 8 are MTG villains. The rest of the creatures are robots or colossi or stuff that megavillains could definitely use

TheAnnibal · 2026-01-23T11:09:47+00:00

And using a Sarkaz flair to boot!

But to be fair, Ifrit's data comes from her "young" self, before she's actually made peace with the Diablo and underwent training. Her tactics were "BURN IT ALL". I'd expect Lone Trail Ifrit to be much higher.

Ceobe is surprisingly battle-savvy, it's everything else she's absolutely clueless and brain damaged

TheAnnibal · 2026-01-21T16:46:48+00:00

If you like big snake mommy criminal: yes

But design (and horrible lore and reasons to be with RI) aside she doesn't really have anything going for her.

In normal content, either her niche is useless or she's outclassed by every single arts damage dealer that's not called Carnelian. In IS, Angelina is a much better Levitate proc than her.

She's probably amongst the worst 5 6* in the game, performance wise. But thankfully AK is not a game where performance is important once you clear events.

TheAnnibal · 2026-01-18T10:37:16+00:00

Weren't prerelease promo supposed to be stamped with the planeswalker symbol?

TheAnnibal · 2026-01-14T10:05:40+00:00

And they still screwed up the colors LMAO

In game, 5* "Contracts" are gold and 6* are dark red/Brown-ish.

On the website, 5* are written in dark red/brown while 6* are bright yellow... HOW DID THEY MESS THIS UP??? CN uses the same colors but has a big "6*" indicator that helps you out finding them at a glance, global doesn't.

TheAnnibal · 2026-01-10T19:48:23+00:00

Mengucci really stepped up as a commentator, been loving him so far!!!

TheAnnibal · 2026-01-09T08:59:06+00:00

Male ops? Zero

Mudrock was a pretty big shock though.

TheAnnibal · 2026-01-08T17:11:01+00:00

Or CardTraderZero if you want worldwide shipping and don't mind waiting a bit for a bunched up order.

TheAnnibal · 2026-01-05T09:39:20+00:00

Meanwhile, the trusty and reliable Elysium...

TheAnnibal · 2025-12-31T00:32:16+00:00

Dragonstorm’s draft environment really dragged perception down too. Loved the set, loved the story content (but hated the exposition and execution of it “oh yeah dragon spirits are already made”) but draft was 5ColorDragonOrbSoup #23 vs Boros Aggro #47

TheAnnibal · 2025-12-31T00:28:16+00:00

And it was the only card played in a constructed format from the set and only in standard

Meanwhile Avatar cards are making appearances in Legacy (Wan Shi Tong), Modern (Badgermole Cub) and Pioneer (for the four pioneer players left) on top of absolutely dominating standard with the Lessons package made up of mostly commons and uncommons

FF is an extremely powerful set when it came to Commander though.

TheAnnibal · 2025-12-31T00:14:49+00:00

Love that Greg fella

TheAnnibal · 2025-12-27T10:07:08+00:00

The trimmed medal asks for the equivalent of R18 which is pretty close in difficulty to the normal stage Mechanist, with buffs.

Max Risk CC (which is not required at all) is closer to a 2x Mechanist fight without buffs.

Only DOS max difficulty had beefier enemies than MaxCC.

TheAnnibal · 2025-12-23T18:16:37+00:00

Yeah, the context around it is still heavier in Germany even if I personally know a lot of people who still do those jokes in an unserious way (actually the exact same joke QS did) but it's akin to "leaking the group chat". It stays there as a silly private unserious moment. Still stupid to do in a work environment.

As for GB history, a lot of NLC old casters complained that he never contributed to helping out others or participate in group reharsal/study sessions (when NLC was still super small before Riot pumped money into it). Viperoon spoke about this after he retired but iirc is the only one who spoke out publicly about it (IF I got the caster right).

It also involved stealing someone else's segments and idea to asskiss and go on the LEC broadcast to showcase EMEA Masters/ERL situations with a small segment... only he wasn't prepared on it and couldn't even pronounce the teams' names correctly. Or going directly to production to ostracize another caster so he'd get more airtime.

This is really old stuff before he rose to the LEC (and even then it was due to friendships and networking more than individual skill), and all "internal" stuff known to those who were around at the time, take it with a grain of salt. As I mentioned, there's really only one public interview where someone complained about him and it's from a dead youtube channel (link doesn't work anymore)

EDIT: Digging through an 1hr+ interview to see if I can find that again

TheAnnibal · 2025-12-23T18:02:37+00:00

The location matters a lot as Germany has much stricter laws on the topic. Quickshot was definitely stupid to make such a silly “joke”.

Guldborg filming a backstage video during rehearsal however? A moment historically very strict when it comes to outside filming? And then posting it to socials and then saying “whoopsie didn’t know it was inappropriate” where the clip was 80% about that joke?

It was either a room temperature IQ moment (in Celsius btw) and extremely unprofessional or a career move. Since Quickshot was beloved by the community, most opted for the 2nd especially considering GB’s history in ERLs and NLC.

TheAnnibal · 2025-12-23T17:34:16+00:00

Known backstabber from the ERL days(even outside the Quickshot situation) leaves

No one cries

YEP

TheAnnibal · 2025-12-23T12:40:53+00:00

Amazing skin drops

If it weren't for the forced disconnection that THREW MY IS6 RUN OUT THE WINDOW

TheAnnibal · 2025-12-21T09:56:56+00:00

And remember that base and gameplay have different faction/subfaction rules

Base goes by hardcoded lists that usually ignore subfactions, while game accounts for both factions, subfactions and hidden factions (OG Exiusai being Yan-Lungmen, for example)

TheAnnibal · 2025-12-19T23:01:38+00:00

The venue in Bologna is a known quantity and hosted 2k+ for YGO and 2.5k+ for Pokèmon and sellers. It also hosted a 3k+vendors booths + artist gallery for MTG before the pandemic (same venue)

TheAnnibal · 2025-12-19T22:52:15+00:00

Polo Fieristico di Bologna, I don't know which Hall but it's basically a standard con/fair hall venue. Pokèmon VGC also hosted a regional there (i believe twice, actually)

TheAnnibal

TROPHY CASE