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Ep. 25 - Total Eclipse of the Heart
19 Plays6 months ago
We've got it all! Lorwyn Eclipsed talk, deck building talk, hot off the presses Fallout Secret Lair talk, and more!
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Transcript
00:00:13
Zachary Jeblonski
Hello,
Welcome and Casual Conversations
00:00:14
Zachary Jeblonski
hello. Welcome back to another episode of Midlife's Crisis. I'm Zach. I'm joined again by Charles.
00:00:19
ciderspence
How's it going, and Zach?
00:00:20
Zachary Jeblonski
I'm doing good.
Super Bowl: A Social Event
00:00:22
Zachary Jeblonski
Are you a a Super Bowl fan, party enjoyer?
00:00:27
ciderspence
Yeah, i'm I'm a casual football watcher, but I do generally watch the Super Bowl, and I'll typically try to have a few people over or go to somebody's place. How about yourself?
00:00:37
Zachary Jeblonski
I'm not usually. i feel like this year I might try and make an effort because it's it's it's nice for like just to get a reason for people to get together and all that. I think my significant other here has some friends that are more into football that might host something.
00:00:45
ciderspence
Yeah.
00:00:52
Zachary Jeblonski
So we'll see.
Cultural Shifts and Monoculture
00:00:54
Zachary Jeblonski
But and I know this is like the most hacky comedian thing ever, but like the commercials aren't what they used to be, right? I feel like every time I've watched the Super Bowl lately, it's just the commercials just they don't hit like they used to.
00:01:04
Zachary Jeblonski
don't know. Has that been your experience?
00:01:05
ciderspence
Yeah. Yeah, I think there's a lot that goes into it. But i I think, yeah, just I think the era just isn't what it used to be. Like, it's just less often the case that everybody sees something at the same time and is impressed by it as much anymore.
00:01:19
Zachary Jeblonski
Oh.
00:01:19
ciderspence
Right. Like it used to be the case that you wouldn't see those commercials until the Super Bowl. Then everybody or most people would see them and then everybody would talk about them. Now, no no part of that is true anymore. Like not as many people watch the Super Bowl.
00:01:29
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:01:31
ciderspence
Not as many people do the same thing anymore.
Generational Changes in Culture
00:01:33
ciderspence
Not as many people see the same thing at the same time anymore. Not as many people talk about the same thing at the same time anymore.
00:01:36
Zachary Jeblonski
Oh, you're you're talking you're talking about the mot you're talking about the monoculture, aren't you? there are the lack thereof now.
00:01:42
ciderspence
Yeah, I think that's part of it, yeah.
00:01:45
Zachary Jeblonski
i Yeah, I guess so that is that's something that like, oh man, that's i mean that's a topic much bigger than a topic than podcast about magic. But I do lament the fact that like, and this is like the most boomer thing that's trying to come out of my mouth, is that like, you know, Gen Zers and people like that, they just they will have no concept of the monoculture of like,
00:02:05
Zachary Jeblonski
the like oh here's a thing that everybody watched and then everybody enjoyed or whatever everybody you know consumed in some way and we can all talk about it and that doesn't exist anymore and presumably never will again which is uh it's an interesting thought to think about
00:02:20
ciderspence
Yeah, it's it's another example of what it's what it's like to reach midlife, right? It's like you get to you get to become old enough to see the things that you you, know, to get your own back in my day.
00:02:31
ciderspence
And, you know, that is every generation has one.
00:02:32
Zachary Jeblonski
yes to get my own back in my day
00:02:34
ciderspence
That's that's one of ours.
00:02:36
Zachary Jeblonski
Oh, man. And I don't know if I should butcher this quote. I should look it up real quick.
Magic: The Gathering and Cultural Reflections
00:02:39
Zachary Jeblonski
But it's like one of my favorite from The Simpsons, which is I used to be with it. And then they changed what it is. And now what I'm with isn't it. And it's going to happen to you, too.
00:02:50
ciderspence
Yeah, true. true
00:02:53
Zachary Jeblonski
All right. Let's get into it. to it So i don't I won't have i all I either will have less or the same amount to talk about as far as games played because the only games I got in were the games that we got a kitchen table.
00:03:08
Zachary Jeblonski
But there's a fair amount to talk about with upcoming stuff or stuff that's like going to be really soon. But let's let's do the normal. So did you get games in past of what we did on the kitchen table or just kitchen table?
00:03:21
ciderspence
Yeah, I got a couple of games in last night as well. So I can i can tack those on after we talk about the...
00:03:24
Zachary Jeblonski
Okay, hit me up.
00:03:26
ciderspence
Well, OK, so I played three games last night. I tried to keep track of turns, but
00:03:33
Zachary Jeblonski
Okay.
Magic Games: Strategies and Adjustments
00:03:34
ciderspence
didn't do a great job.
00:03:35
ciderspence
I know that the first game went like 11 turns. The second game went maybe slightly fewer, maybe eight or nine turns. And I didn't track for the third game.
00:03:44
Zachary Jeblonski
Okay.
00:03:46
ciderspence
But one of those games, I think the middle game, featured what will be my card of the week this week, which is Pestilence. It is two black black, an enchantment at end of turn.
00:03:54
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:03:56
ciderspence
If there are no creatures in play, sacrifice Pestilence. And you can pay a black mana. Pestilence deals one damage to each creature and each player. That's pretty good.
00:04:07
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, it's it's it's a really good card.
00:04:07
ciderspence
So this... Yeah, this this card hit the board in a fun... This game started, we played we played a you know pretty average game one.
00:04:20
ciderspence
Somebody mentioned that they wanted to play a sillier deck in game two. And I said, oh, can we play our silly stuff? Because I brought a silly deck. I brought a mono white lifelink cats themed deck.
00:04:31
Zachary Jeblonski
Okay.
00:04:31
ciderspence
And so I was playing that. My deck had actually kind of popped off a bit. And was it felt like it was going a little too hard, which maybe we'll talk about a little bit later. And so I kind of dialed it down and I was holding back a little bit in terms of what I was playing.
00:04:44
ciderspence
and then this card hit the board and the player who played it just had complete control about whose creatures lived and whose died. And it was,
Magic Gameplay: Online vs In-Person
00:04:53
ciderspence
you know, it it immediately shifted the tone and tenor of the game, uh, to the point where one of our pod mates got pretty frustrated and was like, I thought we were playing our silly decks.
00:05:01
ciderspence
He was playing a Kibo, uh, deck.
00:05:05
Zachary Jeblonski
Oh yeah, I know Kibo, yeah.
00:05:06
ciderspence
And I guess, I guess he could,
00:05:06
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, the there's bananas out.
00:05:09
ciderspence
Yeah, exactly. And so he was he was trying to give people bananas and have silliness, and none of us were using the bananas. like you guys yeah aren't even eating the bananas. So he was he wound up doing the least at the table and was pretty frusted was frustrated by it.
00:05:22
ciderspence
But yeah, Pestilence came down, turned a fun game into a serious game.
00:05:24
Zachary Jeblonski
was it Was this on...
00:05:28
ciderspence
It got real very quickly.
00:05:30
Zachary Jeblonski
Was this in person somewhere or was this on Spelltable?
00:05:33
ciderspence
This was in person. Yeah, i went to one of the game shops.
00:05:34
Zachary Jeblonski
Okay.
00:05:36
ciderspence
On Thursday nights of pre-release, I will typically go to one of the shops that I like that at midnight will sell the product that's available on Friday.
00:05:45
Zachary Jeblonski
Gotcha.
00:05:46
ciderspence
So I picked up a little bit Lorwyn stuff there.
00:05:46
Zachary Jeblonski
Okay. Nice. Now, Petulance is an interesting one because I have almost put this into like so many decks and I never did.
Chaos and Strategy in Magic
00:05:56
Zachary Jeblonski
It's like Petulance borders on that like type of card where i'm like, oh, I don't know if this is too mean to put in decks.
00:06:06
Zachary Jeblonski
you know the the The deck I think I most often is is Valgovoth, my Valgovoth death, because it triggers when people take damage on their turn. So if I have Petulence out, that just guarantees me a trigger every turn because i just hit it once, boom, do a damage, get Vagabal trigger, draw a card.
00:06:22
Zachary Jeblonski
But yeah, it's it's a really, really good card. And it's just something that like... it's like opposition agent like i i've wanted to jam opposition agent so many times but i'm like i know what's gonna happen is opposition is i'm gonna draw opposition agent in like a pod that is just not with it and it's just gonna be a dead card so but yeah pestilence is cool it's it's it's cool good bad not bad all at the same time it's a vibe shifter for sure
00:06:52
ciderspence
Yeah, I think that's a great way to say it. It is a vibe shifter.
Reflecting on Magic Strategies
00:06:56
ciderspence
So yeah, I mean, that player wound up not winning, but they also instantly became archenemy and had some pretty strong archenemy turns almost until the end of the game.
00:07:06
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:07:07
ciderspence
they They got to flip a Sephiroth, so they had the emblem going, and they were gaining life and draining when creatures died. And so even as we tried to knock them out, He gained just enough life to to live, but wanted them one of the players was playing one of the earthbending toffs and had a 12-powered, double-striking, unblockable land. So ultimately that came through. It came for all of us, but it came for him first.
00:07:31
Zachary Jeblonski
It came for all of us that's That's a good horror movie. I've watched that. the the un Unstoppable, Unblockable Land that came for us.
00:07:37
ciderspence
Yeah. It's got a great soundtrack. It sounds like the secret tunnel.
00:07:41
Zachary Jeblonski
Yes. Nice. Okay. And then we'll what was the other game you played? or the other Or one of the other games, at least, that you played?
00:07:53
ciderspence
Let's see. the im trying to remember what I played in the first... Okay, the first game I played Aisha of Sparks and Smoke, which was at a slightly refactored version of my Dragon's Approach deck.
00:08:06
ciderspence
So let me read what Aisha does.
00:08:06
Zachary Jeblonski
Okay.
00:08:09
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah,
Magic Deck Strategies and Synergies
00:08:10
Zachary Jeblonski
I'm not familiar with this one.
00:08:11
ciderspence
So she is one red red. she She is the in-universe version of Ken the Burning Brawler from the Street Fighter Secret Lair.
00:08:17
Zachary Jeblonski
Oh, that's why.
00:08:18
ciderspence
So she's a 4-2 human warrior with prowess, and you can play a hybrid red-white, and she gains first strike until end of turn, and then she has the text. Whenever she deals combat damage, you may cast a sorcery spell from your hand with mana value less than or equal to that damage without paying its mana cost.
00:08:34
ciderspence
So the goal of this deck is to play as many Dragon's Approaches as possible, but with the add-on that I tried to play as many
00:08:39
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:08:44
ciderspence
copy effects as possible so i i'm running arcane bombardment i don't have a twinning staff in there although i might add one if i can find one around the house but arcane bombardment there are a couple of like i'm playing primal wellspring that flips into a land that lets you copy it's copy it's in their sorcery if you cast it uh pyromancer's goggles lets you copy and it's in their sorcery and there are a few more so i think the goal here is to have enough cards to be able to either attack with her, she has vigilance, or just cast one from hand or from exile if I have one exiled somewhere, get the effect, and then keep her up as a blocker so that if somebody attacks me, I can block with her. And her text says when she deals combat damage, not to a player.
00:09:28
ciderspence
So even blocking with her triggers her a ability so that you can cast the sorcery with adjusted timing rules.
00:09:34
Zachary Jeblonski
that's a good That's a good catch. I didn't notice that on first read that it's combat damage and not to not necessarily to a player.
00:09:40
ciderspence
Yeah.
00:09:42
Zachary Jeblonski
Okay, and that's really cool. Yeah, I didn't i kind of didn't know she existed. So that was cool.
00:09:46
ciderspence
Yeah. Yeah, so that was a fun game one. And then, like I said, oh, I played Bazri, Tomorrow's Champion, was my commander for game two.
00:09:54
Zachary Jeblonski
Basri.
00:09:55
ciderspence
This is from the Aether Drift set, which nobody liked, and this is a very bad commander. He is one white mana. You can pay white and tap and exert Bazri to make a 1-1 white cat creature token with lifelink.
00:10:08
ciderspence
And you can cycle it for two and a white. When you cycle this card, cats you control gain hexproof and indestructible until end of turn. So this card would be useful if you were running a cat typo strategy, but it's major usefulness point is somewhat negated by having it as your commander.
00:10:27
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:10:27
ciderspence
but I did not let that stop me.
00:10:27
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:10:29
ciderspence
So I was running it as a commander and I was running a few bounce effects. And the goal was to go very, very wide with cats and also have the mana up to be able to bounce it to hand at instant speed and cycle it away to protect my cats from one massive swing.
00:10:43
ciderspence
It
00:10:43
Zachary Jeblonski
Okay.
Deck Building Insights and Anecdotes
00:10:44
ciderspence
did not play out that way, but that is that's kind of my my fun con, as it were.
00:10:49
ciderspence
So I'm going to keep playing that deck until I get to do that once. it It worked well for this silly game we were having. Well, what was silly until Pestilence showed up. So I had a good time with that one.
00:11:00
Zachary Jeblonski
Okay, cool. I remember i remember that card being spoiled or talked about when Ace of Tricks was revealed. and it's just a it's a It's a weird one. yeah I mean, it's it costs one mana, I guess. that That's the that's the like the counter argument, right? Which is like, you know, what do you what do you want? You know? Yeah.
00:11:20
Zachary Jeblonski
All right, cool, cool, cool. Yeah, so I guess we'll talk about some of the the kitchen table games that we got. I'll kick this off because it involves my card of the week, which I will just get to in the course of playing. So we were playing two five-player games, and I started off with the deck that talked about on last week's cast, which is my Zira Arian Insect-led Minotaur typal deck. Yeah.
00:11:48
Zachary Jeblonski
And I would say it did or did pretty well. it did it did and I think it did almost about as well as it possibly could have. I got some of, I got a really good draw. I got really lucky, I would say in that game. And one of the really good draws, I literally top decked it and I saw it my hand, i was like, ooh.
00:12:06
Zachary Jeblonski
is Deathbellow Warcry, it's five red, red,
Successful Magic Deck Performance
00:12:11
Zachary Jeblonski
red. You search your library for, it's a sorcerer, you search your library for four up to four Minotaur creature cards with different names and put them on the battlefield and then shuffle.
00:12:20
Zachary Jeblonski
So, I mean, this is something that red really doesn't get to do ever, if it's why. So it's just a unique card, but you know but it's very specific to just Minotaurs where you tutor creatures directly from your library to the battlefield.
00:12:31
Zachary Jeblonski
So I was able to get basically the four... basically the four best Minotaurs in my entire deck. And one of them being Sathron Hurlun General, which if when he or another non-token Minotaur enters, I make another two, three Minotaur.
00:12:46
Zachary Jeblonski
So basically I got him and three other good ones, plot them on the battlefield. Sathron saw himself and the three others, so made four tokens. So I had a pretty, pretty significant board state along with a Chromus Memorial that I drew earlier in that game.
00:13:00
Zachary Jeblonski
So that's about as good as that deck I think can do. I think realistically, I don't know if I could have a better like sequence of turns in that. So I was very happy with that.
00:13:08
ciderspence
Yeah, things were going quite well for you at that point.
00:13:10
Zachary Jeblonski
yeah Yeah, I was very happy with that. And like I know said, i like I didn't win, but I definitely felt like the deck did the thing. The deck did the thing it possibly could have possibly done because I'm like, look at the rest of these cards in this deck.
00:13:21
Zachary Jeblonski
And like, I don't know what other cards I possibly could have drawn that would have been better what than what I drew. Yeah.
00:13:26
ciderspence
And remember when we were talking about you putting the deck together, we were questioning whether the deck was minotauri enough. I would say that it also passed with flying colors in that regard.
00:13:31
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:13:35
ciderspence
At that point in time, your deck was very minotauri.
00:13:36
Zachary Jeblonski
Well, I'm glad to hear Yes, I'm glad to hear it. You know, so so, yeah, I mean, i it's it's good. I mean, it it did it was
Exploring Themes in Magic Decks
00:13:47
Zachary Jeblonski
it was as strong as it possibly could have been, I think. Like, I don't know if I could have had a better line of cards. And we got to see some good Tarngrath shenanigans, which was fun.
00:13:56
Zachary Jeblonski
until I turned them off by playing in a chroma's Memorial, which allowed, which made it so I couldn't tap them anymore. And I didn't think that one through, but, so Tarn Garth is cool. which is the whole reason it's in John to begin with. uh, yeah, no, real solid on that, that, that side.
00:14:11
Zachary Jeblonski
then for the first game you were playing something that I am thinking about and delaying.
00:14:19
ciderspence
The first game I played, Lycia, who is the backup commander to Edgar Markov from a pre-con a while ago.
00:14:23
Zachary Jeblonski
Yes, that's right.
00:14:28
ciderspence
She says the following. Lycia, Sanguine Tribune, five, red, white, black. A legendary creature, vampire, soldier. She costs one less to cast for each life you gained this turn.
00:14:41
ciderspence
She has first strike and lifelink. She is a 4-4 with the ability pay five life, put three 1-1 counters on Lycia. Activate this ability only on your turn and only once each turn.
00:14:53
ciderspence
So it is commander that if you build around, can be recast very cheap if you're getting a lot of life.
00:14:59
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:14:59
ciderspence
And can get you the life back because she's got lifelink. she's a She lets you pay life if that's something your deck does. And she gets big because you get to put counters on her.
00:15:11
ciderspence
So I think it's, I don't know if it's Voltron-y because I think, i don't know, part of what could be good about her is that you can use her, sack her, and then recast her for cheap if you've gained a lot of life that turn.
00:15:24
Zachary Jeblonski
yeah
00:15:26
ciderspence
But I don't, The deck I played doesn't build around any of those aspects. It builds around her creature types. So it is a vampire soldier kindred deck. So I think I'm running 20 or 21 creatures whose types include both vampire and soldier.
00:15:42
ciderspence
A lot of them are reasonable. Some of them are not that reasonable. And then there's you know some kind of good stuff vampire things that that have to do with lifelink around that.
00:15:52
ciderspence
But I hadn't played this deck maybe in a year or a year and a half. And so I just wanted to dust it off. It was it was pretty fun. I will say I think i didn't I didn't pilot it well, and I feel like I navigated that game pretty poorly compared to what i like to play.
00:16:02
Zachary Jeblonski
Okay. yeah
00:16:18
ciderspence
compared to how I like to kind of direct my gameplay. And so I wish I was more familiar with it so that I could have had a more alert presence in the game. I think I was kind of trying to figure out what to do and I felt a little behind and I kind of made some choices that I wish I had not made in hindsight, but that that is Commander, baby.
00:16:41
Zachary Jeblonski
I mean, it's tough, and especially, you know, in and the dynamics of a five-player pod, it's like threat assessment and stuff like that just becomes that much trickier. Yeah.
00:16:53
Zachary Jeblonski
I mean, I could say same thing about my, you know,
00:16:54
ciderspence
In particular, my threat assessment that game was not great.
00:16:57
Zachary Jeblonski
No, I mean, i I had similar issues there. like you know Because the the deck that I've ended up winning, and which was a Final Fantasy pre-con with Cloud, the Naya one, I knew it was strong because I've lost to that pre-con before. not
Complexities of Threat Assessment in Magic
00:17:14
Zachary Jeblonski
not to that specific player in pre-con, but I've lost it in stores, and I've lost to it upgraded. and But you know for me, it was always like...
00:17:22
Zachary Jeblonski
I'll get one more turn. I'll be able to figure this out. So let me handle these other players first and blah, bla blah, you know? and that turned out to be, wrong.
00:17:31
Zachary Jeblonski
but yeah, it's just tough. It's just tough when you have that many more variables to consider and all that. What? Oh, I got, yeah, I got board wipe. That's right. Yeah. I, I, to be fair to me, at least I was trying to kill the person I knew was probably going to board wipe me. So I did try to do that. And I was like trying to, trying to kill this person before they found the board wipe. Cause I'm like, they were in the exact colors, you know, to find one.
00:17:54
Zachary Jeblonski
I didn't quite get there before I lost my board, which is fine.
00:17:59
Zachary Jeblonski
And then the second game was a, was a grind them out. We, we, we've learned valuable lessons and that'll be one of my new 2026, uh, resolution, which is, Valgovoth comes out in the last game, regardless of whatever everybody else is playing.
00:18:15
Zachary Jeblonski
so we got in, I played, uh, the sin.
Sin Deck Mechanics and Modifications
00:18:20
Zachary Jeblonski
deck that I have, which is the, uh, four black, green, blue, and I don't have the card pulled up but right right now, but you know, when he comes into the battlefield or attacks, I exile permanent at random for my graveyard and make a token copy of it.
00:18:34
Zachary Jeblonski
that's tapped. And, uh, so the deck is just full of incident sorceries to fill up my graveyard and then, uh, big things to, uh, reanimate in quotes because I'm not technically reanimating them. I am just making copies of them.
00:18:48
Zachary Jeblonski
i'm I'm making exiled copies of them so that I can never do it again. kind of thing. Uh, but it is one of my favorite decks. It just always seems to do something. think it just speaks to the inner Timmy in me. so, uh, the game was like, it was a slog, but, uh, the deck itself did all right.
00:19:06
Zachary Jeblonski
And then you had a hack or not. I want to say high hacks, but was it Lila something?
00:19:11
ciderspence
Lila, yeah.
00:19:12
Zachary Jeblonski
Lila. Yeah.
00:19:12
ciderspence
I wanted to talk a little bit about the SYN deck, and I think something that came up for me in this game that i I've been thinking more about how to deal with going forward. In that game, so you played the SYN deck, which I had played before, and one of our pod mates played a Master Multiplied.
00:19:25
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:19:30
ciderspence
Was that the the Master Multiplied deck, which he he had played before, and I want to read what it does.
00:19:31
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah. The master multiplied.
00:19:42
ciderspence
And to do that, I need to type faster. The master multiplied. Legendary creature, Time Lord Rogue, four, black, red. Myriad, the legend rule doesn't apply to creature tokens you control. Triggered abilities you control can't cause you to sacrifice or exile creature tokens you control. It is a four, three.
00:20:04
ciderspence
So... I think in the last game I played against you with the Sin deck, Sin went wild and dominated the table. You got an omniscience out in that game.
00:20:16
ciderspence
And i i don't remember whether you won, but I assume you won because you had a massive board presence.
00:20:22
Zachary Jeblonski
i I won and then a big part of that winning well not outside of the omniscience was i I basically stole somebody else's hullbreaker horror and then then and at that point the game is just mute because I can just omniscience cast anything I want at any time and remove stuff bounce spells all that stuff so I have since take omniscience out of the deck.
00:20:32
ciderspence
Oh, yeah, that's right.
00:20:44
Zachary Jeblonski
I still have like omniscience like things like k Nick's blue mentions in there. So, but like omniscience and stuff, I took it out I'm like, yeah, it's probably just a little too much.
00:20:54
ciderspence
Yeah, that's fair. And then our pod mate had played this, the master multiplied deck before. And I believe the last time I saw the master multiplied, it also ran roughshod over the table because it created tokens.
00:21:07
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:21:10
ciderspence
And one of the tokens it created was its own token with Myriad. And when the tokens didn't die, If they got to swing again, they so the tokens also had Myriad.
00:21:21
Zachary Jeblonski
Yep.
00:21:21
ciderspence
So it just like, it basically was one or two swings and the game was effectively over because they're they're pretty big.
00:21:21
Zachary Jeblonski
yep
00:21:28
ciderspence
They're four threes and, you know, enough copies of those. And, you know, he was also doing other things. And once the once the tokens are there, it was free to amass more tokens. So it it kind of,
00:21:41
ciderspence
overran the table pretty fast. And so that was that was also in my memory. But I think because of that, I was a little too anchored on treating both of those decks as Omega-level threats.
00:21:56
ciderspence
And there's a fine line because I think they are both Omega-level threats. And I think the thing I want to be able to do going forward is to be aware of them
00:22:03
Zachary Jeblonski
That's it.
00:22:08
ciderspence
kind of throughout the game and just kind of check in on them. Like basically, I think the thing to do when you're facing commanders like that is to play the game and pay attention and to try to be on the front side of when that deck is about to do the game ending thing and try to stop that.
00:22:25
ciderspence
But I think I was a little too preemptive with my actions towards both decks. I think I was a little too aggressive in my responses to both decks before they really did anything.
00:22:35
ciderspence
And to your point, you changed your Sin deck. You took out the Omniscience. I don't know what other cards you may have taken out.
00:22:40
Zachary Jeblonski
Not, not much. I've done, i always do like, I'm always tweaking every deck of mine. So I've done a little here, a little there, but like overall it's just omniscience just because I thought I've created an unfair play pattern in terms of like, I'm going to take the longest turn ever now because I'm probably going to play something and I'm probably going to draw a card that caused me to draw more
Game Dynamics and Strategic Decisions
00:22:59
Zachary Jeblonski
card. You know, it's like, you know, the omniscience problem basically.
00:23:03
Zachary Jeblonski
But I mean, the the deck is, it is similar to the one you played against where I did pop off that one time. I think it was at the store where like, it is something you have to pay attention to, but I did want to add like a point of complication that I think warped everyone's threat assessment a little bit, which was like, so one of our other pod mates played Grave Pact.
00:23:24
Zachary Jeblonski
And the, you know, great pack that if if anyone doesn't know, i don't even need to look it up. i I think I have it memorized, which is one black, black, black enchantment. Whenever a creature you control dies, each opponent sacrifices a creature.
00:23:36
Zachary Jeblonski
So that prevented me from playing sin for like three to four turns. So I kept a pretty much like non-existent board save for a while.
00:23:42
ciderspence
That's fair. Yeah.
00:23:44
Zachary Jeblonski
On purpose, like I had demanded a place in, but I didn't want to do it into the great back because I was like, I wasn't sure that I do to send triggered ability. It wasn't guaranteed that I would hit creature token or creatures in my graveyard.
00:23:56
Zachary Jeblonski
So it'd be very likely that I had to sacrifice sin before I got a chance to swing with them. So I just didn't play them until I figured out how I was going to navigate that. And I think it kept me looking less intimidating and then other players looking more intimidating. So like a lot, i think a lot of the attention got shifted in that way.
00:24:13
Zachary Jeblonski
And I'm speaking like I won the game, which I didn't because ultimately I wasn't able to like, i think I think taking that many turns off allowed everybody in the pod to kind of build up their own board states to the point where when I popped off, it it wasn't as as scary.
00:24:28
Zachary Jeblonski
But I think it was just like, that was a very complicated threat assessment game because you do have, you know, I put sin at that level of master multiplied of like,
00:24:37
Zachary Jeblonski
if i Once I start getting the ability to swing with it, like I'm not hitting like i'm not heading duds. and like There's no duds in my my library. If there's a permanent in the graveyard, it's a permanent that's a problem. like just to give you some but like kind of background info on sin is there's no permanent in the deck that's less than five mana.
00:24:55
Zachary Jeblonski
So every permanent in that deck is a big, and you know, so, so yeah. So it's like one of those things where i'm like, yeah, what do you do? Right. Because the master multiplied is exponential growth, exponential damage.
00:25:05
Zachary Jeblonski
Uh, once they start attacking and sin on the other hand is like, Oh, I've got like soul tie grossness just building up and so in this graveyard that is just waiting to come out. Right. So,
00:25:17
Zachary Jeblonski
and then, you know, and then the third complication is great pact where it's like, oh okay, well, like if I don't want to spend my mana putting creatures on the battlefield, because I'm going to lose them. Then maybe I'm spending my mana on interaction. Right?
00:25:29
Zachary Jeblonski
So it's like this, this very complicated situation.
00:25:35
ciderspence
Yeah, I had forgotten about the Grave Pack, and you're right, that did warp the game significantly. I think the point I just wanted to make about how it kind of is going to inform my gameplay going forward is just to...
Balancing Past Experiences and Strategy
00:25:50
ciderspence
We've talked before, probably off cast about the concept of game memory. I'm a big proponent of bringing bringing last game into this game, at least in terms of like, I like to play games where the same person doesn't win all the games in a night.
00:26:04
ciderspence
I like to try to factor in what I've seen from a player's deck building on a given night, especially when you're playing in a pod of people you don't play with that often, to infer what I think is going to happen and use that to try to prepare for the future instead of just playing the cards as they lie. And I think that game in particular made me want to rethink that a bit. I still believe in game memory, but I do think I want to get a little more adept at reading the room as I'm playing.
00:26:36
ciderspence
seeing what a deck's actually doing in addition to being aware of what it's capable of or what I've seen that deck or a version of that deck do before, just in terms of threat assessment, but also just gameplay choices. Like there are lots of decision points in a game, where to use interaction, when to hold back a card that you think isn't quite appropriate for what's going on at the table at a given moment, like you were saying about opposition agent.
00:26:59
ciderspence
Sometimes for reasons other than gameplay, the thing to do could be to hold back a card that might otherwise be really good in a situation just because it doesn't feel like it's the right time to play it.
00:27:09
ciderspence
And I want to be a little more attentive and alert to those opportunities in games that I play going forward this year. So it's kind of like a delayed a delayed blast New Year's resolution, as it were.
00:27:24
ciderspence
i want I want to bring that forward going into my games.
00:27:24
Zachary Jeblonski
No, I like it. And and yeah, and and and I like it. i you know, I, i mean, i'm not 100% the other way, but I am.
00:27:34
Zachary Jeblonski
i am on the other side of the spectrum where I truly believe, like I tried to play magic where like I wipe my memory clean after every game kind of thing. it's not possible. like This is just like an aspirational thing that I have because like i you know of course like we're not capable of of forgetting everything from one game to the next. and And I do actually try to play games as they are in the moment regardless of how I know that deck has done in the past.
00:28:04
Zachary Jeblonski
I guess the best example I keep thinking about is is there's a player i play with somewhat frequently in a shop I go to when I can do on Tuesdays and he's got a uh, mono white Avacyn deck. that is pretty well tuned. I mean, it's pretty good.
00:28:17
Zachary Jeblonski
to the point where like I lose to it often. but i always try to play games against that deck. I think I don't try to like, remember like, Oh, like,
00:28:27
Zachary Jeblonski
uh you know how the last games went i i it's it's like a weird i'm having trouble articulating it but i do try to like look at the current game state and then try not to think too much about like what the deck can do because i've also seen that same deck draw like four planes in a row on a turn and like lose and you know he's got an absent but the big whoop he's just getting 60 damage swung into him kind of thing It's challenging. Like all this stuff is just really challenging. It's just one of the one of the reasons why Commander is, i think, just, i overall, I think it's a fantastic game just because there's so much complication to it.
00:29:01
Zachary Jeblonski
there's like the meta level of, oh, I have this memory of what this deck can do. There's the current information of like, well, what do I see the deck actually doing right now in front of me? and, uh, it just creates, uh, yeah, it creates some really challenging decision-making and you, just you and me and everybody else, we don't, we don't get it right often, you know, and that's just part of it. It's just, there's too many variables.
00:29:26
Zachary Jeblonski
but I will say to your point, oh, go ahead, go ahead.
00:29:26
ciderspence
Yeah, i think so I think I just wanted to add on, this is also another add for instant speed, flexible interaction.
Flexible Interaction in Deck Building
00:29:36
ciderspence
Because I think to think that I, and i've you know i as I've built Dex, I've leaned this direction with most of my interaction being in instant speed and or.
00:29:36
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:29:46
ciderspence
target non-land permanent at least versus just creature or artifact or enchantment or whatever, where possible. But I think being able to deal with threats at instant speed whenever a deck might be trying to win is a much more satisfying game or allows for more satisfying gameplay patterns than just having your you know your sorcery speed board wipes or sorcery speed interactions that kind of force you to do things when it's convenient for you turn wise and mana wise just being able to i think that enables you to in some cases
00:30:26
ciderspence
wait to see how things play out before you decide whether to deal with something. And it can make a lot of difference between whether a player doesn't get to do anything in a game or you or they get to do something, but you also have the ability to stop them before they take the game over. I think that's something that I want to continue to nudge nudge my deck building towards going forward as well.
00:30:50
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, I think this is going to be interesting. I think we should like, you know, maybe I'll i'll write a note to myself as like revisit this episode next year. Right. And, uh, it's, you know, one of the great things I like about playing with you and, and, and, and other players is that everybody comes to the game differently. And like, I'm, I am almost like the opposite of what you just said, where like, I am, I have more and more focused on sorcery speed stuff of like board wipes.
00:31:19
Zachary Jeblonski
and less on ands instant speed interaction. and I used to be against boardwipes when I first started playing the game. And and I talked about this briefly offline with the, about the meta that I came up in and and I've been slowly kind of working out of my system where, you know, when I first learned to play commander, I came from a meta that just, and when I say meta, I mean like the people I was playing and the vibe that they had, which was like,
00:31:44
Zachary Jeblonski
Uh, low interaction, not a lot of board wipes, the timious deck often wins that kind of thing. And I've kind of just kind of morphed out of that because I was like, magic is just too diverse. There's too many things you can do to just limit yourself to red, green and variants of red and green. and, uh, you know, so I just kind of been factoring that in, I understand the downside of the board, white, which is like,
00:32:09
Zachary Jeblonski
I mean, you can really kick somebody while they're down with a board wipe because it's like, I can't choose, you know, to like leave this person alone in a board wipe. Everyone gets affected kind of thing. but yeah, it's, it's interesting how we all just kind of come to this differently in different ways. and I guess here's, but here's Zach's tip of the week, which is like, I don't really don't like running in instant speed interaction. That's like,
00:32:31
Zachary Jeblonski
or just a one for one, just on like on on a value basis. So pretty much all of my instant speed interaction is MDFCs. it's the it's the you know If I'm in black, it's the two instant speed removal spells that are lands on the backside, Felda Profane and Hagermalling.
00:32:47
Zachary Jeblonski
Or it's Sync into Stupor, which is the mono blue MDFC that returns a spell or a permanent. like Almost every deck I have, also my interaction is usually like an MDFC.
00:32:57
Zachary Jeblonski
So there's there's a little something for everybody.
00:33:02
ciderspence
Yeah, I mean, that makes sense. I think flexible, flexible, flexible. I just think flexibility is very valuable, especially in the format these days.
00:33:09
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:33:13
ciderspence
So i yeah, I totally get that.
Fun vs Competitive Play
00:33:16
ciderspence
I just, I think, I guess to to kind of wrap with my thoughts on this is kind of mini topic, I just, I think that the ability to be precise,
00:33:29
ciderspence
in the threats you're handling or the situations you want to respond to is valuable for, I think, the type of commander I want to play going forward, which is optimized for play experience versus necessarily being optimized for percentage chance of winning.
00:33:37
Zachary Jeblonski
Okay.
00:33:47
ciderspence
And that probably doesn't hold for every game of commander I play, but it definitely is going to hold for some of the games of commander I play.
00:33:55
Zachary Jeblonski
It's very hard.
00:33:55
ciderspence
So to the extent that I'm building decks for like different types of games, I think I do want factor that in.
00:33:56
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:34:02
Zachary Jeblonski
It's very hard to, I mean, you, you can't, you can't do everything at once, you know, like, like you can't, yeah, it's very hard to get all those goals, but it's admirable to go for them, you know, like,
00:34:14
Zachary Jeblonski
we, you know, i talked about opposition agent and omniscience, you know, there are other things that I'm not willing to bend on. Like, I think I have definitely like grown to like realize that like board wipes are are healthy for the game. and there's things that like, I'm, you know, going to include in my decks. I think they're fun and I don't think they're that bad, but yeah, like you should, like there are certain cards or certain like things you can do where I'm just like, there's just no if, ands or buts about this. Like,
00:34:41
Zachary Jeblonski
unless I'm playing with the, the sweatiest of the sweatiest people, like no one's going to enjoy this, you know? so don't put it in. Right. And that's kind of the opposition agent thing. Right. even though someday, someday i want to opt somebody. uh, so yeah. else on that game before we kind of wrap up that section?
00:35:02
ciderspence
Yeah, I'm just going my commander because i I wound up winning that game because to
00:35:06
Zachary Jeblonski
Oh, yes.
Successful Game Strategies
00:35:06
ciderspence
your back to the point about Grave Pact, the game wound up going long enough because we kind of kept the board a little light.
00:35:16
ciderspence
while the Grave Pact was out to avoid having to sac lots of important things that she was able to get going and I got some key support pieces down and I was able to pull it out by making some some big beers.
00:35:30
ciderspence
So I played Lila, Holographic Assistant, three in a blue, Legendary Artifact, Legenday Artifact Creature. the The notes for this card reminded me that there's a typo on it where Legendary is misspelled as Legenday.
00:35:42
Zachary Jeblonski
Oh, wow.
00:35:45
Zachary Jeblonski
Oh, my God. Now got to look it up.
00:35:45
ciderspence
But a legendary artifact creature, a human advisor, whenever you draw a card, put a 1-1 counter on target creature. She's a 2-2. So I think the thing I thought of immediately when I saw this card was Danny Pink, another good magic card, who says the first start basically the first time you put a 1-1 counter on a creature...
00:36:00
Zachary Jeblonski
Yep.
00:36:09
ciderspence
on your or on any turn, draw a card. So together they read, draw a card for each creature you control, if you draw a card, you know, card aim counter for each creature you control whenever you draw a card on anybody's turn, which is pretty good.
00:36:27
ciderspence
And this game went long enough that I was able to get Danny Pink down. I went wide with uh meanwhile illusionist i made an illusion a couple of times and i basically had four or five creatures out such that i was drawing four to five to six cards a turn uh and then you know i was able to find the interaction i needed to kind of deal with some threats and protect my board a little bit and then i was able to make some big swings and bring it bring it in from there
00:36:58
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, I think, no, it but it did very well. Very solid. I mean, it it was just, it definitely exemplifies not that anybody was doing this issue, but it exemplifies the the threat assessment thing of like, if you see a player drawing a lot of cars, they're the threat, regardless of what their board says.
00:37:14
Zachary Jeblonski
and that's something that I've taken more in account in the last year or two, uh, is, is cards in hand versus just what's on the battlefield. And now, now the deck did very solidly. Like, I agree. I think the great fact work to your advantage, which is, which is nice.
00:37:30
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, because because because you know the other opponents you had were, you know, you had the Cloud Precon again. He's a Voltron deck. Grave Pack is really good against Voltrons. Then you have me where, like, all my stuff is Timmy-like, and I don't really have a lot of token generators in the Syn deck, so, like, I'm not going to be able to, like, outproduce the Grave Pack triggers.
00:37:50
Zachary Jeblonski
So, yeah, it was it was really nice, like, setup for for Lila to kind of show what Lila can do.
00:37:56
ciderspence
Yeah, and in particular, the Grave Pact worked or interacted well with Minwily Illusionists because when I got to choose what to sacrifice, at least once, maybe twice, I was able to sacrifice an illusion and then put something on the board from hand, which in one of those cases was Danny Pink.
00:38:05
Zachary Jeblonski
Yep. Yep.
00:38:13
ciderspence
Once I had a big enough board that I wasn't worried about losing all of it to Grave Pact. So, yeah. Yeah, think it
00:38:19
Zachary Jeblonski
Very nice.
Current Deck Building Projects
00:38:20
ciderspence
was just a, I think, that yeah, to your point, the length of the game and the pace helped out a lot.
00:38:27
Zachary Jeblonski
and so let's move on to some of the stuff that's or let's let's talk about briefly because i do want to talk about some of the cards coming out here uh any decks you're are working on
00:38:38
ciderspence
I'm going to build something from Lorewen Eclipsed. I think I'm going to try to build the transforming Aisling, not the pre-con Aisling
00:38:48
Zachary Jeblonski
yeah the flippy back and forth one yeah
00:38:51
ciderspence
Yeah, the flipping back and forth one. So I'm hoping that I pulled one of those from the the product I picked up at midnight. But if not, I'll have to search for that. And yeah, I want to build an Aisling from only cards from the set.
00:39:06
ciderspence
So that, and I'm working on a tree folk deck.
00:39:06
Zachary Jeblonski
Nice.
00:39:09
ciderspence
Those are the two things I'm working on.
00:39:12
Zachary Jeblonski
Okay. I've got pretty much, I've got my new Esper deck ready to go. I don't know if I brought this up in the last episode, but I'm, know, I'm moving a little bit away from the popular commanders and just kind of getting back to my roots of like, because when I first started playing commander, I really, I i was always really excited about commanders I never heard of or didn't see often. So I kind of want to get back to that.
00:39:32
Zachary Jeblonski
So I've switched my Ishtola deck to the Destined Warrior, which is off of the Final Fantasy Scene packs from the holidays.
00:39:44
Zachary Jeblonski
But the Destined Warrior, and that's the name of the creature, is a one white, blue, black legendary creature, human warrior, first strike, vigilance, menace, cleric, rogue, warrior, and wizard spells cost one less to cast. there be any combat on your turn, creatures you control get 1-0 to end of turn. And if you have a full party, they get three o instead to your party. So it is it you know it is what it says it is. It is a party deck.
00:40:08
Zachary Jeblonski
I think I have... six of every party member. six clerics and then a variety of, shapeshifters to kind of fill in the holes.
00:40:18
Zachary Jeblonski
but it's been nice cause there's a lot of like, I guess what's nice with a, with a typo deck like this is there's a lot of like, uh, value that can be had by various clerics and warriors, you know, like, you know twilight prophet is a cleric and, you know, that's the one where at the upkeep, you, uh, reveal the top quality library and put the hand and each opponent loses X life or X is its amount of value. Right. So like, you know, you put in these typos and, you know, they become big beaters and they also have value they bring on their own. So I think it's going to be an overall pretty, pretty solid thing.
00:40:50
Zachary Jeblonski
And then other else than that I'm working on is, is I'm, I might resurrect my green red green deck, the Rydia. I bring that back because I kind of miss playing that deck, but I might bring it back and just kind of ignore the saga part of it and just focus on the landfall.
00:41:04
Zachary Jeblonski
So I think that's what might happen because right now red and green is Bellow and Bellow is very popular. So I want to kind of take him apart next. So yeah, that's why i got
00:41:13
ciderspence
that's Rydia, Summoner of Mist.
00:41:15
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, I think you saw it. You saw it once a kitchen table and i think once a level one. And the reason why I kind of took the deck apart originally because it's like I really tried to stay away from landfall when I built it and just focus on the saga portion of her.
00:41:32
Zachary Jeblonski
But I think this I'm just going go back and do the landfall portion of her. I think she's I just I keep coming back to her i think she's like really good. And I just don't think people understand like how good she is in terms of card selection. So I'm going to read, just read her off in case the readers need to know, or the listeners, which is, she's just red and green. So already off to a good start with two mana.
00:41:51
Zachary Jeblonski
Uh, whenever a land you control enters, you may discard a card if you do draw a card, which I think is super powerful. And then she can pay X tap return target saga creature or saga, uh, with a man of X from your graveyard, uh, with a finality counter on it and it gains haste long term activated only as sorcery. So,
00:42:09
Zachary Jeblonski
I think the ability to, uh, loot, wait a minute. It's not loot. It is rummage. There we go. The ability to rummage every time you put a land into play, I think is incredibly powerful. And I just kind of want to demonstrate that. I think, I think people need to know.
00:42:25
Zachary Jeblonski
so that, that's, so that's a pretty, it might come back. but yeah, yeah.
00:42:28
ciderspence
I do feel like one of your one of your life's missions is to bring discard back. So this is kind of just another spin on that.
00:42:34
Zachary Jeblonski
i you know me i've i've got I'm always looking for a reason to bring this card back.
00:42:39
ciderspence
Don't I know it.
00:42:39
Zachary Jeblonski
But card draw is too powerful, man. I can't i can't win against it. All right. Anything else you want to talk about before we move on to some stuff that's coming up?
00:42:50
ciderspence
Nope, I'm
New Cards and Strategic Analysis
00:42:50
ciderspence
going to move.
00:42:51
Zachary Jeblonski
All right, cool. Let's talk about Lurwen. there's one really, there's one card in there that I didn't know existed. Then I heard it on, on goldfish and lost my crap as I was driving. Cause I just, my mind just started spinning into the possibilities, but we're going to save that one for the end.
00:43:08
Zachary Jeblonski
and I'm just going to kick us off with a rating schemes. and this is a card I'm not sure if I'm going to put anywhere, but I'm curious what your thoughts are, which is a three, green, red enchantment.
00:43:19
Zachary Jeblonski
Uh, each non-creature spell you cast has conspire and conspire is when you cast a non-creature spell, you may tap two on tap creatures that, uh, share a color with the spell you're casting. And when you do copy it and then you can choose new targets for the copy and a copy of a perm becomes a token.
00:43:34
Zachary Jeblonski
what's your thoughts on this enchantment? I think it's really good, but I also like, don't know where I would put it.
00:43:37
ciderspence
Yeah, that sounds great.
00:43:41
ciderspence
That sounds, it sounds pretty good to me. It is expensive and you'd have to cast something.
00:43:44
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah. Yeah. yeah
00:43:47
ciderspence
So i guess it could suffer from like the, you know, the doubling season problem where you play something scary and then you, you either play it early enough that you have to wait a turn around the table or you wait long enough for you to be able to do something with it.
00:44:01
ciderspence
And by then has the game passed you by, but It's in green, so I could see ramping into being able to play this on turn four or five, and it seems really good there.
00:44:12
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, I have... I think the closest deck I have for this is my Samlet deck, which is the speed one. Because, you know, at full speed, she gives... it's It's four less for non-creature spells. So, like, I can get this down to a red and green, and then most the spells in there are non-creature, so that's probably where I'll put it.
00:44:33
Zachary Jeblonski
I think it's good. i don't think it's, like... insane just because of that requirement to have two additional creatures that have a color. and The deck that I immediately thought of when this card was kind of revealed, which I can't put it in, the color identity doesn't match is my P and Alar deck, which makes Thopters when I play anything from Exile.
00:44:55
Zachary Jeblonski
But those Thopters are colorless. So it's like one of those things you do have to remember that like the tokens that you tap for, or the creatures that you tap for this have to share color with your spell. but I'm interested to see what it does. I could be, I think it's going to be an okay card. I don't think it's going to be like a crazy card.
00:45:11
ciderspence
I think it might be a crazy card. Like if you have a deck that has red in it and green in it and has some sort of red finisher, this just seems great.
00:45:24
ciderspence
If you have two creatures on the board, you can copy your crackle with power. Seems good.
00:45:28
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:45:29
ciderspence
If you have two creatures on the board, you can copy your faded firepower. Seems really good. If you have anything that's going to do damage without having to attack, like, I don't know, two creatures by the turn that you put this down or by the turn after you put this down doesn't seem like that big of an ask.
00:45:48
ciderspence
And it it seems like a lot of the being able to copy any number of the red finisher things you could do seems good. So I think this could be a standout, but we'll see.
00:46:01
ciderspence
I'm curious to see how it plays out.
00:46:01
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah. And I think you, I think you were likely correct. I do. so yeah, let's see. next one that I, I kind of pulled out is, uh, Twilight Diviner.
00:46:12
Zachary Jeblonski
cause this is an effect you don't really see, or I'm not aware. i don't believe this effect exists in magic yet specifically, but it's Twilight Diviner. It's two and a black, elf cleric.
00:46:22
Zachary Jeblonski
When this creature enters surveil two, And when one or more creatures you control enter, if they entered or cash from a graveyard, create a token that's a copy of one of them and it only triggers once a turn.
00:46:34
Zachary Jeblonski
So this is kind of like your, you know, Panarmonicon or whatever type of effect. for reanimation decks. But the fact that like you get this trigger when you reanimate, not just if you cast them from the graveyard, which I think is pretty unique and kind of cool.
00:46:50
Zachary Jeblonski
And then just kind of a quick footnote is no, this won't work with Sin because Sin is not casting the creatures and the creatures aren't entering from the graveyard. They are being exiled and making tokens of them.
00:47:01
Zachary Jeblonski
So it doesn't work for Sin, specifically for me, but for a lot of reanimation decks or decks similar to that, I think this is pretty cool.
00:47:10
ciderspence
Yeah, I think it's cool and it is nice to have a spin on, you know, the double triggered ability instead of just double the triggers for some category of things.
00:47:22
Zachary Jeblonski
yeah instead of it being like uh if a creature entering me your graveyard does something do it twice kind of thing it's like okay you know this one's actually a little bit like kind of neat and a little little spin on it
00:47:23
ciderspence
So I...
00:47:34
ciderspence
Yeah.
00:47:37
Zachary Jeblonski
i threw this one in nobody's i don't think i haven't heard it on any other podcasts or seen it around but i think it's cool But once again, I don't know where it would go, which is a Tam mindful first year one and a hybrid Simic color pip, legendary creature, Gordon, wizard. Each other creature you control has hex proof from each of its colors.
00:47:57
Zachary Jeblonski
Tap target creature you control becomes all color slant turn. So to me, this is like a non-white mother runes in a way. it's not as good as mother ruins, but also this is in colors that don't, you know, have mother mother ruins.
00:48:14
Zachary Jeblonski
I think this is an interesting card. Like I, I'm not sure the value of cards like this, where you are signaling to your opponents that you can do something. Like, I'm not sure the value of that. I think it's okay.
00:48:25
Zachary Jeblonski
it could force people to use single target removal on somebody else's stuff because they're like, oh, he could just activate it and make it blah, blah. I'm not sure the value of this, the fact that she doesn't have haste or she can't tap immediately, stuff like that kind of changes things.
00:48:40
Zachary Jeblonski
I still something I wanted to kind of bring up cause it might be something I'm thinking of it as a 99, not a commander, by the way.
00:48:46
ciderspence
She does automatically protect your five color good stuff though, right?
00:48:50
Zachary Jeblonski
Yes, she does.
00:48:50
ciderspence
Giving them all hexproof from each other colors is pretty good.
00:48:51
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah. Five color decks. Yeah. Yep. For sure.
00:48:56
ciderspence
Yeah,
00:48:56
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, for sure. I didn't, i didn't think about it from the five color perspective.
00:49:01
ciderspence
yeah and even your, I mean, basically if your creature has white or black or or red, I think you feel pretty good, right? Like you might still get bounced, I guess, if you don't have blue and you might,
00:49:10
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:49:13
ciderspence
get turned into an artifact and dealt with if you don't have green, but I think you know if your creature is white or black and has Hex root from white and black, I think that gives you a large measure of comfort just having her on the board. So I think that's pretty good.
00:49:28
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, we'll see.
00:49:29
ciderspence
Yeah, this this could be one of cards I build around from the set too.
00:49:32
Zachary Jeblonski
Okay. All right. Now here's what we've all been waiting for. I, I'm super hyped for this card and I I've already put like seven of them in my TCG player, like cart.
00:49:44
Zachary Jeblonski
it's mirror form.
Excitement for Mirror Form Card
00:49:46
Zachary Jeblonski
It's a four blue, blue instant. Each non land permanent you control becomes a copy of target non or a permanent.
00:49:54
Zachary Jeblonski
Holy crap. All right. This, this, this stuff you can do with this card is great. the thing I keep coming back to is board wipe protection. So somebody board wipes in response, you just have all of your stuff become a land or something like that.
00:50:12
Zachary Jeblonski
And you know you still get all your value, you have lands, yada, yadda yada, yada. But it also has this drawback that I've been thinking about too, which I think is a, which I think is why the card is balanced in a way, which is if your commander's on the board, your commander becomes that thing. And realistically, you're never getting your commander back.
00:50:33
Zachary Jeblonski
So if you turn into a land, for instance. So it's an interesting card where like it can do amazing things or like, and I'm just talking about like one sliver of what you could do The other thing you could do is like turn, you know, all your non lands into somebody else's, i don't know, gold span dragon or something like that. Right. Or whatever. Right. Like, like there's just this card is wild and I love it.
00:51:00
Zachary Jeblonski
sir
00:51:00
ciderspence
Yeah, I'm just now realizing it does not say until end of turn.
00:51:04
Zachary Jeblonski
no
00:51:07
Zachary Jeblonski
so i mean i am going to jam this in pretty much every blue deck i think for me like i think it's like now obviously it's six mana so you don't like oh i gotta hold up six mana in case somebody does something it's like a borderline protection is pretty weak and i get that and i'm with that and i'm for that but from the fun perspective and and like like man if my commander's not on the battlefield and i've got 12 non land permanents on the battlefield or whatever. And somebody has a board wipe and I turn them all into command towers.
00:51:34
Zachary Jeblonski
Oh, oh, yeah.
00:51:38
ciderspence
I don't know that I've seen a blue deck that I feel is this committed to anything. Just to turn everything into one thing. It just seems so, yeah, I still, even as I reread it, I'm still expecting to see until I turn.
00:51:46
Zachary Jeblonski
It's so cool.
00:51:53
ciderspence
That is, that's incredible.
00:51:53
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, you're yeah, it's forever. Yeah.
00:51:56
ciderspence
Okay, yeah, I'm curious to see this in action now.
00:51:56
Zachary Jeblonski
And like,
00:52:00
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, I mean, you know, it's it's it's great when it's not your turn. It's great when it is your turn. It's, it's this is why I love blue. And it and and and it it's also like, it's all these things, and I don't imagine it being that salty of a card too, which is what I like, which is like, I'm not turning anybody else's stuff into things. Like, all I'm doing is turning all my stuff into something.
00:52:23
Zachary Jeblonski
yeah.
00:52:24
ciderspence
Yeah, and it importantly, isn't just your stuff either, right?
00:52:24
Zachary Jeblonski
and
00:52:26
ciderspence
It's of targeting permanent.
00:52:27
Zachary Jeblonski
yeah
00:52:28
ciderspence
So, yeah.
00:52:29
Zachary Jeblonski
Yep. And the other thing the other thing I like about it is from an administrative point of view, it's relatively easy to handle. So all of my stuff is becoming one thing. So like, say I turn everything into a command tower, then basically all i have to do is just put like a D20 on my command tower and be like, all right, have 19 command towers, right? Like I don't have to have like, you know, 14 different tokens and blah, blah, blah. And you know, all that stuff. No, it's just like everything becomes this. Right.
00:52:55
ciderspence
Does Becomes automatically infer loses other types and abilities?
00:53:00
Zachary Jeblonski
Yes, it does. They are, your commander is now a command tower.
00:53:01
ciderspence
Okay.
00:53:04
Zachary Jeblonski
That's what it is. And it that means it loses creature.
00:53:07
ciderspence
Got it.
00:53:08
Zachary Jeblonski
It loses everything else. It's just a command tower. It does retain its name or it it is the card, I should say. yeah.
00:53:16
ciderspence
Yeah, it retains its card identity. So if it's still a creature and you still swing with it, you still accumulate commander damage. But yeah.
00:53:23
Zachary Jeblonski
Yes, yes. But like the the danger is like if you turn your commander into a land, i don't know how you get your commander back ever unless you happen to have some way to bounce lands in your deck.
00:53:35
Zachary Jeblonski
and you can't choose which of your permanents become copy of the thing. You have to do it all. It's all or nothing. Right. yeah, it's just like the, the possibilities are just crazy with this card.
00:53:48
Zachary Jeblonski
I'm looking forward to it, you know, with the to seeing it in an action.
00:53:51
ciderspence
Yeah, it seems pretty wild.
00:53:54
Zachary Jeblonski
yeah. And then, uh, this just came in last night.
Secret Lair Cards and Thematic Designs
00:53:56
Zachary Jeblonski
I was at dinner and I saw this on my Twitter feed. you know, they're doing a, another fallout magic layer or magic layer, a secret layer.
00:54:04
Zachary Jeblonski
Uh, this time again about the TV show, which I really enjoy. I'm, it's another situation where i'm like I really like these characters. So now I want to build these. But I plucked two There's three of them, but the red one didn't appeal to me, but it's an equipment energy thing. So feel free to look it up up out there if you guys are interested. but I'll start with the one I'm probably most excited for is Lucy McLean, positively armed, uh, four and a white legendary creature, human survivor.
00:54:31
Zachary Jeblonski
She has, whenever a token enters, you may have target player other than its controller, or create a token. That's a copy of it. Then you draw a card. And if an opponent created a token this way, then you draw a card if an opponent created a token. So I do this only once you turn.
00:54:45
Zachary Jeblonski
I really liked this design. I'm, uh, if I'm lucky enough to be able to secure the secret layer, I'm probably going to build this as a commander. it's, it's an, it's like group huggy to a point, but I think it provides enough value to you as a Lucy player to like incentivize, you know, trying to get people to, to take you up on it.
00:55:03
Zachary Jeblonski
and I, I think it's just a neat design. I like it. And it's very, it's very like apt to her character in the show.
00:55:10
ciderspence
I don't think people have to take you up on it, right?
00:55:13
Zachary Jeblonski
No, they don't. That's i'm saying. You, you definitely, this is a conversational deck for sure.
00:55:14
ciderspence
Yeah.
00:55:17
Zachary Jeblonski
Like, cause you're not going to want to trigger this unless the person commits to taking it kind of thing. You have to be like, Hey, you want a copy of that? And if you do, know, let me know and I'll let you do it. You know, kind of thing. You have to have that conversation I think ahead of time.
00:55:31
ciderspence
Gotcha.
00:55:32
Zachary Jeblonski
cause there's nothing Commander says you can't have conversations around triggers.
00:55:35
Zachary Jeblonski
Right. You know, cause like I can just choose, yeah if you say no, I just go, all right, well then I won't trigger it.
00:55:36
ciderspence
That's true.
00:55:39
Zachary Jeblonski
Right. Yeah. So, yeah. So I think, you know, you know, you could get into like one of those stodgy pods where like no one, everyone's like, no, I ain't taking No, no, no, no. I don't ever want you to draw a card. And it's like, that's fine.
00:55:50
Zachary Jeblonski
It's fine. It's okay. Like I'm fine with playing a deck where like you have that, that, that happened from time to time. but I think enough times people will be like, wow, I really needed a treasure for my next turn. And that guy just made a treasure. Yeah. I'll let you draw a card kind of thing.
00:56:04
Zachary Jeblonski
so yeah. what do you think about that card?
00:56:07
ciderspence
Yeah, it looks cool. i That it's mono white. My immediate thought is, are there toxic tokens you can give out? But in mono white, I can't think of many. I'm sure there are some, but if this was...
00:56:18
Zachary Jeblonski
No. And you can't force people to do it either.
00:56:22
ciderspence
No, you I think you can, right? Whenever a token enters, you may have target... You may, but target player doesn't get to choose whether they create it.
00:56:27
Zachary Jeblonski
Oh.
00:56:30
ciderspence
So you may have target player, other than its controller, create a token that's a copy of it.
00:56:33
Zachary Jeblonski
Wow. I misread that.
00:56:34
ciderspence
Then you draw a card if an opponent created a token this way. So you choose whether or not anyone makes a token copy of the token that enters. So you can just say, you get it.
00:56:45
ciderspence
They don't get to choose.
00:56:45
Zachary Jeblonski
Oh, that's even better than I thought.
00:56:46
ciderspence
You get to choose. Yeah, it is. Yes. So yeah, you could still do the politics about you know who wants this token and what are you going to do for me? But you could also just say, no, you you get this token and I get the card.
00:56:53
Zachary Jeblonski
Yes. Yeah. yeah
00:56:57
Zachary Jeblonski
Nice. I'm excited for it now. I'm even more excited.
00:56:59
ciderspence
yeah
00:57:00
Zachary Jeblonski
I was excited before, but now I'm even more excited. That's cool. Yeah. Yeah. Like, I don't think, I think it's pretty rare that like, you know, some, going be able to give somebody something bad, especially since I am not, it's not when I make a token, it's when an opponent makes a token.
00:57:16
Zachary Jeblonski
Oh no, it is when
Concerns Over Secret Lair Accessibility
00:57:17
Zachary Jeblonski
I make it.
00:57:17
ciderspence
Right.
00:57:17
Zachary Jeblonski
Huh?
00:57:18
ciderspence
Yeah.
00:57:19
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:57:19
ciderspence
Well, just whenever a token enters.
00:57:19
Zachary Jeblonski
See, I, Yeah, i I don't plan on going that.
00:57:21
ciderspence
Yeah. i But I'm thinking of cases where you could, uh, well, you don't get to copy that. I mean, i I feel like a lot of white's tokens come from removing stuff.
00:57:31
ciderspence
Uh, so yeah, you generous, give somebody something you get to give two players an elephant and draw a card. That's pretty good.
00:57:37
Zachary Jeblonski
yeah and i Yeah, I mean, I can do like... I'm not going to do it, but I know if somebody else out there, like you just do smothering tides, probably fine. You know, like, cause like I make the treasure, I force somebody else to make the treasure.
00:57:49
Zachary Jeblonski
I draw a card next turn. I make the treasure. i force somebody else to get the treasure. I draw a card, right? Like you can do stuff like that. There's lots of ways to make, I know this is a shocker for everybody in magic land, but in in white, there's a lot of ways to make tokens.
00:58:02
Zachary Jeblonski
So,
00:58:03
ciderspence
yeah
00:58:05
Zachary Jeblonski
so yeah, I, I don't plan on being too toxic with this. it's mostly just going to like, uh, white value and just try to make a generically good white deck. And then she's just the commander. And then I get to have some fun conversations, which is kind of what I'm looking for from her.
00:58:20
Zachary Jeblonski
so yeah.
00:58:23
Zachary Jeblonski
Uh, uh, next one is, uh, the ghoul gunslinger. Also, also I haven't seen season two. I'm i'm basing all my interpretations of the characters off season one, which I really enjoyed, but I also liked his character a lot from season one.
00:58:34
ciderspence
I haven't seen an episode two, but I did enjoy episode one. So I i also have high hopes.
00:58:37
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah. Yeah. lu Lucy's Lucy's really cool. And then so the Google gunslinger is one black black legendary creatures, zombie mutant rogue. Whenever the ghoul or another non-token zombie or mutant you control dies, target player gets two rat counters. And if that player is you, you create a church token. I like this design. I mean, it's clearly leads to like a reanimation style play or, you know, stuff like that. I'm not sure exactly where it'll go. I don't, yeah I don't plan on making him a commander, but I definitely want to have him. I'll probably put him in one of my decks.
00:59:08
Zachary Jeblonski
But I just like the flavor. i like the idea of just giving yourself rad counters, which I think is like always kind of cool in a way. It's like, yeah, I'll give myself the cad counters. I'll mill a little bit, whatever.
00:59:18
Zachary Jeblonski
So yeah, I like both those designs. I'll just address the topic real quick. Yes, I think it's super, super lame to put mechanically unique cards in a limited release first come first serve system. I think it's BS. I think it's terrible.
00:59:34
Zachary Jeblonski
And then on the flip side of that is I'm a filthy, filthy consumer. So I totally understand the hypocrisy of what I'm saying. I just wanted to put that out there in the air in the ether.
00:59:43
ciderspence
Yeah, I don't mind it. think it's fine.
00:59:48
Zachary Jeblonski
but I know we're running a little bit long. Is there anything else you want to talk about before we wrap it up?
00:59:52
ciderspence
No, I'm good. I'm excited to crack some Lorewind Eclipse and talk about what I did with it.
00:59:57
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, Lauren equipped pretty cool. Also real quick shout out the art fantastic for Lauren eclipse. I'm always a big fan of, especially in universe art. this one does not disappoint. So go look up.
01:00:10
Zachary Jeblonski
I've seen some Tik TOKs lately of, uh, magic's been like watching, like has videos of like the the artists. and the process of them creating the paints for these cards. And it's just like, as beautiful as you think these cards are, imagine what they look like when they're like three feet by four feet. And it's, it's the amount of detail doesn't come through in the cards sometimes. And yeah, so shout out to the artists. It looks great.
01:00:33
Zachary Jeblonski
But yeah, I will, we'll talk again next week. Thanks for joining me, Charles.
01:00:38
ciderspence
Thanks for having me, Zach.
01:00:40
Zachary Jeblonski
All right. I'll see you guys later.
01:00:43
ciderspence
Take it easy, everybody.