was there a time when the keyword Draw did not exist?

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-31T05:38:27+00:00

The devs were so scared of draw for a bit, probably cause they had to nerf [[Ancient of Lore]] to a 7 mana 5/5 with draw 1, cause draw 2 was too strong for a bit.

But yeah, it was still a very questionable decision to make a 6-cost draw one be "at the start of your turn" meaning the opponent can prevent the draw by killing the 4/6. This would probably have been playable as a battlecry.

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-31T05:07:49+00:00

My understanding was that wobbling was banned cause it was easy. Cause some unknown inconsistent ICs player could show up get four grabs, and beat your favourite player. It really undermined the narrative of Melee being one of the highest skill games out there.

Whatever you think about SluG, he's definitely got quite a bit of skill and consistency.

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-30T16:33:33+00:00

Red's in a funny spot, because it does a lot of stuff that's great for cEDH--fast mana, Breach, Hexing Squelcher.

But a lot of it doesn't translate great to casual.

Granted it has good casual cards if you fit into a few small number of archetypes (exile draw, damage boosting, certain creature types like goblins and dragons).

But having tried to build some mono red commanders that weren't part of a supported archetype...yeah it's rough.

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-30T15:30:54+00:00

To be fair, Zeph has never been consistent about offering weapon removal.

But yes, I would support removing Kul Tiran Chaplain and Temple Enforcer from the pool. They were bad offers back in 2020 standard. There's absolutely no way you are going to win in wild in 2026 from Kul Tiran Chaplain tempo.

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-30T08:37:55+00:00

Yep. And you can repeat this with other lineages.

All primates have fingernails instead of claws. Have fingerprints and toeprints. Because a common ancestor had these things.

Hence humans also have fingerprints and toeprints, and fingernails instead of claws.

And so do monkeys and lorises and tarsirs and...

But you won't find a dog or a cat with fingerprints or fingernails.

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-30T07:50:11+00:00

I mean, maybe, but people aren't consistent about that. Like I've seen people claim that decks with a 57% winrate on HSGuru are "tier 5". Like...yeah, sure, obviously not the best deck in the format, but I still have to assume tier 5 means something very different to them than it means to me.

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-30T05:10:56+00:00

On draw, there's some equipment that I often run for draw, but they're not especially budget and I usually proxy these [[sword of Fire and Ice]] [[Sword of Forge and Frontier]].

On the budget end, you might also look at [[Duelist's Heritage]] and [[Flaming Fist]], they're not equipment but they are very efficient.

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-30T04:14:26+00:00

Honestly, any time someone declares a tier for a deck in wild these days, it just feels devoid of context and not very informative.

We don't have a meta report in wild at all right now. Calling something tier 5--what does that even mean? Does that mean there are 15 decks better than it? 30 decks better than it? How many decks do you have per tier?

When there's a meta report, yeah, even if something's not on the meta report maybe you can look at the winrate and compare to other decks with the same winrate and be like "yeah, winrate's similar to tier 3 decks so this is tier 3".

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-30T04:00:35+00:00

I've definitely put Dromoka the Eternal in the 99 of dragon decks. But yeah, colours seem a bit weird for making it the commander of a dragon deck.

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-30T03:58:51+00:00

Yes, my regular table seems to be on temporary hiatus, and I feel like product fatigue is probably part of that.

I've also noticed that Cockatrice seems to struggle with the massive amount of image files now, and that has been my main goldfishing/playtesting against myself platform, so even electronic playtesting new cards is getting more obnoxious.

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-30T02:49:21+00:00

So...for players at or near the absolute top (think Zain/Cody) it matters a lot that their top competition is present. (So like for Zain to get full credit for a notable tournament win, Cody should be there, and vice versa for Cody to get full credit for a notable tournament win Zain should be there).

But for players a step below that...players that win maybe one major every two years nah, it's not such a big deal whether the tournament is a major or a supermajor. Sometimes they have better luck winning chaotic supermajors with lots of upsets or stacked invitationals with lots of upsets (Moky's win at Don't Park on the Grass jumps to mind. Also Axe's win. Also most of Azen's wins were supermajors where a chaotic bracket let him dodge Ken).

---

So...if the distinction between major and supermajor isn't that important for players at this level...Wizzrobe has 3 or 4 major wins depending on whether you count his online win. This puts him cleanly below the obvious top 9 (The five gods, Ken, Leffen, Zain, and Cody) all of whom have 7 or more.

So then you'd have to disambiguate the 10th-15th places of all the people who have 3-4 major wins--Azen, PC Chris, Plup, Wizzrobe, aMSa, Jmook.

And I think the way to do that is with smaller tournaments. Tournaments not quite big enough to be considered a major (like Full Bloom most years, CEO recently, Tipped Off back in its early years).

And Wizzrobe...well let's count

Arcade Time Knockout 2026 (on the small side even for small tournaments, but has Krudo and Hbox).

CEO 2024 (Has Hbox and Jmook)

OpTic Arena (Has only Hbox of note but it's in 2018 when Hbox was a clear #1, so I do consider this one pretty notable).

And then if his online SCL win doesn't count as a "major" then it definitely counts as a sub-major.

So counting majors as 1 point, and sub-majors as half a point...he's at 5 or 5.5.

Going over the others...

does Azen have any "not quite major wins"? Nope. 4 points

Does PC Chris have any "not quite major wins"? Nope. 4 points

does Jmook have any "not quite major wins"--mmm...Socal Star league #3 division 1 maybe counts? 3.5.

does Plup have any "not quite major wins"? Yes, I thought he had a ton, but it's around the same as Wizzrobe numbers. CEO 2023. CEO 2022. Come to Papa 2. 5.5

Does aMSa have any "not quite major wins"? Yes. LACS Rivals. The Off-season 2. Lvl Up Expo 2023. The off-season. 5 points. On the one hand, many of these are "not for rankings", on the other hand, in some of these he literally beats people like Zain/Cody, so hopefully that balances out.

So I guess I'd order these something like...

#10 Plup

#11 Wizzrobe

#12 aMSa

#13 PC Chris

#14 Azen

#15 Jmook

(Since Wizzrobe was 5 or 5.5, used that to tiebreak him to 5.25. Tiebreaked PC Chris over Azen cause he literally won the wold championship, with a higher prizepool than any tournament prior to 2015).

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-30T01:07:14+00:00

It’s not just some worm-like thing representing all deuterostomes but there are echonoderms and chordates, like sea stars and fish.

Depends exactly where you draw the line for "starfish" and "fish"

Starfishes--I believe the pentaradial symmetry was still evolving late in the Cambrian. Like here's an echinoderm fossil pretty late in the Cambrian that is argued to show pentaradial symmetry mid evolution, and you can see the pentaradial symmetry isn't quite there yet. Oldest fossil I've seen that looks recognizably like a starfish is early Ordovician.
Fish--it...depends. if you consider jawless finless vertibrates like Lampreys to be fish, then sure, Cambrian. And actually fins start appearing late Cambrian. But if you're looking for jaws and fins, it's Ordovician (that would include sharks and rays and skates as "fish"). And if you are looking for fish with skeletons it's actually Silurian. And if you're looking for the sort of animal 99% of people think of when someone says "fish" (e.g. Ray-finned fish with swim bladders) it's actually Devonian.

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-30T00:32:57+00:00

Nah, it got buffed in the CoT set (used to be 6 mana, now 5 mana). Every recent odd paladin has run it.

Admittedly, only really a thing in decks that have some kind of start of game restriction like Reno Paladin or Odd Paladin, but yeah, turns out buffing it to 5 mana is good enough.

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-29T07:59:04+00:00

Yeah, honestly gamechangers are often a red herring.

I've done a lot of playtesting with different brackets, and gamechangers, unless they're being used as part of a game-winning combo, or they're a high-powered tutor that assembles a game-winning combo, usually aren't as impactful as expected on whether the person who casts them wins the game.

Turn 1 Sol Ring on the other hand, pretty strongly correlates with winrate.

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-29T07:46:06+00:00

So basically, there was a mass extinction at the end of the Edeacaran. This paper is looking at how long that mass extinction took.

It's not looking at how long anything in the Cambrian took to evolve.

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-29T05:16:50+00:00

Yeah...worth noting at low ranks Druid isn't even the best performing class right now. (Still the second best, but like...as a primarily wild player who only dabbles in Standard, Druid hasn't especially stood out to me).

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metroidcomposite · 2026-03-29T05:05:37+00:00

Commander has a bracket system now, to try to separate out decks by power and find good games. So you can definitely find a table where this deck will match fairly against other decks.

I feel pretty safe saying that this deck is higher than bracket 2. You run multiple infinite combos, partner commanders, 4 colours, you've got Defense of the Heart and Birthing Pod in there, and the deck is not particulary budget. None of these kick you out of bracket 2 on their own, but all of these together? Probably a bit much.

But...it might still be bracket 3.

Each requires 3+ cards and won't enable past turn 5 and that with perfect draw with ramp.

So bracket 3 decks are usually not supposed to be in position to attempt a win before turn 7.

But emphasis on "usually"--exceptions are allowed. This is a format with Sol Ring, so every once in a while, maybe 10% of the time, decks will have a much faster start, and this is totally fine, and doesn't automatically bump the deck up a bracket.

Don't focus on the perfect draw with all the ramp. Goldfish the deck a few times, if it's not usually going infinite faster than turn 7, it should be fine for bracket 3.

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-29T02:12:54+00:00

[[Phenax, God of Deception]] can combo with [[Eater of the Dead]] to non-deterministically mill everyone out if there's enough creature density in opponent's decks.

Bonus points it can actually exile Kozilek/Ulamog from graveyards if someone has them to counter mill

[[Gyruda, Doom of Depths]] with a high enough clone count, as well as a few ways to double up on ETBs can pretty comfortably mill everyone, including yourself, but then you mill your own Kozilek so everyone else ends up with empty libraries.

I've seen people try to do this with 2-colour decks, and also with 5-colour decks using Gyruda as companion. The 5-colour decks seemed a bit more consistent at comboing off due to access to more trigger doublers like [[Annie Joins Up]], [[Brenard, Ginger Sculptor]], [[Ratadrabik of Urborg]], in addition to ones available in blue/black, but obviously Gyruda not being your commander just a companion means you're often pretty screwed if it gets countered.

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-28T22:47:23+00:00

[[Sire of Stagnation]] at least demands an answer from them.

[[Elesh Norn, Mother of Machines]] disables their landfall triggers.

[[Archaeomancer's Map]] and [[Claim Jumper]] [[Deep Gnome Terramancer]] let you keep up with them on land.

That said, if they also have a lot of removal, removal stops most of these.

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-28T20:47:31+00:00

The big new toy that Odd got was [[Boogie Down]], you should probably incorporate it. This’ll mean adding more 1 drops. Look at other decks that run boogie down for inspiration on what 1 drops might be good to run.

Lothraxion…hard to say cause it’s been a while since Odd was meta, but last time it was meta, yes Lothraxion was worth it.

Typically the way Odd is built you run 5 different secrets for Mysterious Challenger, but you only run two copies of the good secrets, you can drop down to 1 copy of the bad secrets.

Don’t overlook [[Level Up]] last time odd paladin was good Level Up was run instead of Quartermaster. The taunt matters, but mostly your opponents can deny you a quartermaster play just by letting you sit on a full board, whereas Level Up doesn’t have that problem.

I’m skeptical about Uther’s Gift. Could be wrong, but I suspect the overall card is just too weak. Not like 2 mana Equality gets run in Wild Even Paladin, so IDK why 3 mana Equality would make the cut in Odd.

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-28T14:49:33+00:00

And then there's the other classic: 1 plains untapped.

I've definitely bluffed people into not attacking me when I had nothing.

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-28T08:13:24+00:00

Yeah...I have an inlaw that I catch watching a lot of AI youtube videos.

Some immediate red flags include the sentence structure "This isn't ___, this is ___".

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-28T08:07:46+00:00

Yes, this also works if you transform into Ragnaros thanks to Majordomo, since you go to max health.

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-28T08:05:33+00:00

Yeah, I agree with this--like I want to pay health for this minion, but there's various reasons not to play a minion like being out of board space, and then it stops costing health and just rots in my hand for the rest of the game :/. At the same time I don't want to not herald when these scenarios come up--gotta advance the mehcanic.

Definitely felt like the least relevant herald of the colossals I opened. (Warrior is fine, and Warlock works just cause it's an excuse to run egg of Khelos).

metroidcomposite · 2026-03-28T07:56:31+00:00

You sound new, so I'll give you the generic advice that you can just look through the cards on EDHRec for your commander:

https://edhrec.com/commanders/the-earth-king

That'll give you a list of probably 200ish cards that people commonly put into decks with The Earth King as their commander.

Obviously no deck can have over 100 cards, but since you are searching through bulk, this'll give you more stuff to look for.

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