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I expect that his deck will be similar to the OathStorm lists. For example: http://www.mtgpulse.com/event/15373#215460.

Wow, this list is actually pretty close    Why not give it a try? Just add Mana Confluence.

So how is Imperial Seal different to the other expensive unbanned cards then? Workshop, Tabernacle, Candelabra, Bazaar all have the same price tag and only find place in very specific deck types, so does the Seal. I doubt that Imperial Seal would go into any Non-Combo decks, so you could do Combo decks a favor to fight the Midrange/Control madness. So why do we have to wait for a Promo Seal when we can have it in October

Not saying that I disagree with you. We'll take this into discussion with the council.

Barring beating down with random critters (usually accompanied by B2B lockdown) yes, you can only combo off with Palinchron. But it is much easier that it might seem out. When going off you just chain draw spells and land untappers until you find Palinchron, which becomes pretty academic after you hit a critical mass of both. The deck can often go off as early as turn 4 when needed, I have done it dozens of times. You just need to recast Tide at some point and suddenly you won't need six lands to go infinite any more. A friend of mine even managed a turn three kill once.

Some people play Emrakul or other form of training wheels that do nothing until you have started to go off, but I strongly advice against it. Don't give in to the fear.

Hukka, our reigning Finnish champion, has a really powerful list for a combo deck revolving around Yawgmoth's Will. Its main downside is insane amount of playskill it requires, and that nobody is willig to test against it. I don't have the exact list, but it's basicly just all rituals, all tutors, all cantrips, all duress/chant effects, lands and the broken stuff.

Öhman (Tiggupiru) has a really cool eggs combo deck. Maybe he could share his list now that our Nationals is over. That deck is definitely competitive and not that impossibly hard to pilote.

Imperial Seal seems to be equal to Workshop in terms of affordance. I find it hard to believe Seal would be banned at first place if it costed the same as miracle tutors. We could discuss unbanning it while waiting for printing of judge promo.

I am not impressed by Generator at all. Satyr Hedonist ramps for equal amount and saw zero play. Are the other features (easier color requirements, haste) so good that they bring the card from unplayable to great? I doubt it.

I will, however, try Aggressive Mining in burn. In case somebody didn't realize, you can use the ability in opponent's turn making it at least draw 6.

There were several red aggro decks and Academy decks that were firmly in contention after 3-4 rounds, but failed to make top 8.

I don't think fast aggro or Ux aggro control are foils to UW. UW already has all the tools to fight them, and is just more consistent. And even if they posessed a real threat against UW, the control deck could just change a couple of cards and even the odds. UW is definitely the deck to beat. As you can see, the lists posted were already more or less metagamed against the mirror.

[Card Name: Market Festival]

Card Name:   Market Festival
Card Color:   G
Mana Cost:   3G
Type & Class:   Enchantment - Aura
Pow/Tou:   
Card Text:   Enchant land
Whenever enchanted land is tapped for mana, its controller adds two mana in any combination of colors to his or her mana pool (in addition to the mana the land produces).

Decent upgrade over Overgrowth. Heartbeat? Then again, probably not.

Verdict: Unplayable

Did you mean this? Not that this was ever played outside limited.

Knowing when to take a mulligan  decides the games now even more than before.

So play skill matters more now? I wouldn't say it's a bad thing.

Good luck trying to win a larger and relevant tournament with control.

Challenge accepted. Two and half months to Finnish HL Champions. (I finished second with UWb control last year.)

Thanks, though I was not happy with the result as I was so close to top 8 and lost to horrendous mana flood two times in a row. The list and a mini report, in case someone is interested.

I was playing BUG Academy ramp (not 5c or esper people seem to put it for some reason). I got the list from so_not who claimed it was the most powerful one, but oh man the deck is inconsistent. I admit I played badly and made wrong tutoring decicions, but if an opponent happens to have an answer to one threat, he has like infinity to execute his own game plan until I finally, if ever, draw any other business.

He has a very fast start with T1 City of Traitors + Signet and T2 Crop Rotation into Academy + Eorn Powerstone + Wasteland followed by T3 Demonic Tutor into Tezzeret, the Seeker but my T2 Sylvan Library found for everything in time and after Chandra Pyromaster hit the Board and start to generate card advantage.

I had Wurmcoil first which he sworded, and then Liliana which left me at just 5 mana after Demonic. I tutored the other Tezzeret to animate signet and kill Liliana, he killed my Tezz and then Sylvan + Chandra took over.

He had some good draws with Shardless Agent and Wurmcoil Engine

Some good draws = I drew all bricks after these two cards. Either I'm extremely unlucky or just bad player, or the Academy deck is not that good.

Hypothetical, if there were a card, which would cost more than 275€ which would neither be broken, nor weak, which would be used in one specific deck type and is only good there but not even the best card or belonging to the best combination of cards in this deck type. Is there any reason to ban this card?

1sbv5qo6

At least they have the better mulligan... 

Who has the better mulligan?

Seems insanely opening hand dependant. Games with Ancestral/Lotus/Sol Ring/Mox/Crypt in opening hand are dramatically different than ones without.

Now on camera playing semis.

I was about to write about the same article, applied on the exactly same deck! I counted the following manas, using mana creatures as a half source and cantrips as 1/4 a source:

Total: 41, 36 lands
G: 30, 21 turn 1
B: 24, 19 turn 1
W: 24, 18 turn 1
R: 23, 17 turn 1

Then look at the tables:


I run the simulation for 100 cards / 41 lands deck with free mulligan applied (though it has no effect on numbers) and unsurprisingly got the same numbers as the 99 card deck. So let's see:

Mana Elf by turn 2: With just 21 untapped sources, the list has just 87,6 % change of having untapped green first turn in otherwise keepable hand. It's just two sources off optimal, so that could be reasonable.

Thoughtseize/Swords/Bolt by turn 2: Given that the deck wants to lead with a mana elf anyway, noncreature 1CC spells being always active from second turn seems more than fine to me. Odds for 1st turn B were 84 %, 1st turn W 82 % and 1st turn R 80 %.



Garruk/Thrun/Witness by turn 3/4: This works.

Hymn/Liliana/Arena by turn 7: This is where things go sour. You have 69 % change to be able to cast 2nd turn Hymn if you draw it, which means it will be uncastable almost 1/3 time second turn - or even more, as some mana acceleration and cantrips won't work until third turn. Third turn castable Liliana is at least 75 %, so you're gonna miss her 1/4 time. About five more black producing lands will be needed to reliably cast early Hymns or Lilys.

Elspeth/Ozbedat by turn 7: Given that 4th turn WW is 80 % with that mana base, this sounds reasonable. However, I'd like three more sources.

Chandra/Hellkite by turn 8: Borderline. 78 % 4th turn RR, 82 % 5th turn. Again, a couple of more sources needed.



Garruk, Primal Hunter by turn 8: Just one triplecaster in whole deck. With this manabase, odds are 79 % 5th turn and 83 % 6th turn. I think this is acceptable. The deck doesn't necessarily need more green sources total, just a couple of turn one sources more.

Conclusion: you can play 4C manabase very well - as long as you stick to single casters. You can include double casters form one or two colors, but you have to tweak manabase more heavily towards those colors.

What I'd like to do next is recode the simulation to calculate optimal number for lands with both free and spoils mulligan, then recalculate suggesterd colored mana ratios based on new land counts. Stay tuned.