Transcript
Zachary Jeblonski: Hello, hello. Welcome to another episode of Midlife's Crisis. I'm Zach and I'm joined again by Charles.
ciderspence: How's it
Zachary Jeblonski: it's going peachy. You know, I know this is a little bit of old news, but you know, you're you're a gentleman who took cu secures their respiratory health. How did you enjoy the wildfire smoke from a couple weeks ago?
ciderspence: I tell you what, I i didn't enjoy them. I think, I mean, you've been in Jersey for a while, right?
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah, a couple of years now, about three, four years, yeah.
ciderspence: Yeah, we had a stretch two or three years ago. This was kind of, you know, a year or two into COVID where there were also wildfires in the area. And there was a stretch of like a week or so when the air was, the air quality was really bad.
ciderspence: I mean, it was the time that I learned about air quality as being a thing. Because, you know, most of the time you just walk around and you don't think about that and the news doesn't tell you about that.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah.
ciderspence: But yeah, it was it was tough. And, you know, I was I was sad about people for whom it was really tough. you know like To me, it was an inconvenience, but I think to some people, bad air quality is actually a health risk.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah.
ciderspence: So yeah, it was not great.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah. What I was going to say is that i'm I've been in a few wildfire areas. Like I was in Pacific Northwest during one of their wildfires just for on vacation. I just happened to be there at the time, you know, and i was like, Oh, this is inconvenient.
Zachary Jeblonski: But this latest one here, you know, just walking places, man, it would, it would take it out of you. so, you know, I know this is gonna be a hot take, which is, you know, pretty early in the morning for a hot take, but I think wildfires are bad.
ciderspence: Yeah, cosine. Yeah, they're not great.
Zachary Jeblonski: Well, I guess I think some limited, I don't know, you know, some expert on forestry, maybe could shoot as a comment or something, but I know that like some fires are important, like forest needed or something, but, uh, probably not to that scale or extent.
ciderspence: Yeah, i I could just as soon go a while without having to interact with one again. But yeah, it was I'm glad that they seem to have stopped or slowed down, or at least the air quality has been better lately. But, you know, knock on wood, not a great thing.
Zachary Jeblonski: Speaking of things that have burned down, let's talk about some magic games. No, I'm just kidding. Or do you want to get decks on deck first? Which one would you like to do
ciderspence: Let's do games, and then i I'll think if there are any decks on deck.
Zachary Jeblonski: Okay.
ciderspence: I've you know i've built i' built through my backlog of decks, mostly.
Zachary Jeblonski: Oh, nice.
ciderspence: Yeah,
Zachary Jeblonski: Okay. All right. So let's, all right. So do you want to kick us off? You want me to kick it, kick us off? All right.
ciderspence: why don't you get us started?
Zachary Jeblonski: I'm going to get started. I'm going to, because I feel like, you know, sometimes I feel like my memory is like a leaky sieve and it's just like thoughts are actively leaving at all times. And if I don't get them out in the ether, they might be gone forever.
ciderspence: that's That's why we're here.
ciderspence: That's literally why we're here.
Zachary Jeblonski: So I'm going to jump right into the game that features my card of the week so that I can make sure that I remember why it's my card of the week. But this was the second game entirely with my new red-white Quintorius deck. This replaced the Boros Super Friends deck.
Zachary Jeblonski: So completely different mode of game. completely different theme and everything to the deck much, much happier with it. It's, it's a lot less taxing on the brain to play.
Zachary Jeblonski: Even though I do, I have already in the two games I've played, I've already missed massive amounts of triggers, especially from monument to endurance. But the the game features my card of the week, and this this kind of stole the show almost because i kind of went full ham with this card. So the card is, without you know without further ado, is a scholar of New Horizons. It's one and a white.
Zachary Jeblonski: It's creature human scout. And it enters with a one, one counter on it. And it has tap, remove a counter from a permanent you control. Remember that permanent you control, search your library for a planes card and reveal it. If your opponent controls more lands than you, may put that card on the battlefield tapped. And if you don't put that bow on the card on the battlefield, you didn't put it into your hand and shuffle.
Zachary Jeblonski: So there's like four points of like, holy crap, this card is good on it. Number one is it comes within a one, a plus one plus one counter itself. So it can activate itself too.
Zachary Jeblonski: You can remove a counter from any permanent that you control three. It's not just basic planes, it's planes. And four, you don't have to put that card on the battlefield. That's also part of the rules text. So like there are signs where maybe you want to fetch up planes and not put it down.
Zachary Jeblonski: So it's it's really good, especially for for white decks without green. But kind of where it's sent it into like hybrid space is in this game, my commander's a planeswalker, it can remove loyalty counters because the commander's Quintorrius history chaser And essentially the commander doesn't really have an ultimate or doesn't really have a negative ability that I care too much about. The negative ability is spirit, you control, gain double strike and vigilance on the turn.
Zachary Jeblonski: I don't, you know, i can make a bunch of spirits, but I don't generally make a lot bunch of spirits the decks. I don't really care about negative fouring. So I don't care about removing loyalty counters. So that's really good. But what I ended up getting down in this game and this really kind of secured the win was I had the legend of Yang Chen down.
ciderspence: Oh.
Zachary Jeblonski: yeah, you see where this is going.
ciderspence: Oh, and now I do. That's pretty good.
Zachary Jeblonski: This is so, the legend of Yang Chen. I'm sorry that this is involving a lot of card descriptions, but it's necessary for the listeners out there to, to get a sense of what was happening. So I had my commander out and then I had legend of Yang Chen out, which is also another card that I think I featured on car of the week. And at it, it's so good. It might, might go into like almost every white deck at this point.
Zachary Jeblonski: But it's three white white saga starting with you. Each player chooses one permanent with mana value three or greater from among permanents your opponents control exile as permanents. So that's four permanents your opponents control getting exiled on the first step.
Zachary Jeblonski: That is if everyone chooses something different. They could all choose the same thing, which I've seen a couple times. But anyway, step two was you may have target opponent draw three cards if you do draw, if you do draw all three cards. So if you have somebody draw three cards, that's not you, then you get to draw three cards.
Zachary Jeblonski: And then the last side is a four five flyer. And whenever you cast your second spell each turn, airbend up to one other non-land permanent target non-land permanent. So I use the scholar and I just kept repeating step two. I didn't go so far as repeat step one, even though I did think about it, Charles.
Zachary Jeblonski: I just kept repeating. Yeah. Yeah. I did, I did, I repeated step two, three times basically. And and you know, three or two, three turns in a row. So I drew nine cards off of this thing.
Zachary Jeblonski: And that more or less ensured that I got to the things that I needed to win. And I don't remember exactly how I won. I think it was, I think it was cool, but rude. But those two things together are, are you know, we're just like backbreakingly good.
Zachary Jeblonski: But Scholarhoom New Horizons is the one that kind of makes all this happen, you know? And it's just it's just really good. i've i've I've literally taken finality counters off of things with this. Like I have, he's it's just such an incredibly versatile card that I recommend to everybody with a white deck, put it in there.
Zachary Jeblonski: And that was my first card of the, or first game of the week. It it was so bad so shifted by this one card that I don't even remember how I won. to But yeah.
ciderspence: It's funny, this is scholars in like this mold of cards that I think I'm hearing more about where part of what makes them so good is that they are not only cheap, but they're on their face, inoffensive enough that it's hard for an opponent to justify removing them, especially if their removal options are limited.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah.
ciderspence: it's like if you're not actively ramping with this even if you're doing something great is it really worth wasting your swords or your path on a scholar of new horizons especially if what it's doing is kind of helping another card on your board go off like in this case if you have one removal spell do you remove I mean, there are different types, but do you remove the Legend of Yang 10 or do you remove Scholar of New Horizons?
ciderspence: Or is drawing three cards, especially if you're eventually going to get a turn to draw three cards, is that even worth interacting with?
Zachary Jeblonski: yeah
ciderspence: I mean, sounds like it should have been because you won the game based on being able to dig for your finisher. But yeah, that's that's great.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah, i and it's also two mana, so like most most people are playing three mana or higher removal spells. So it's just it's just a really tough sell to get somebody to want to spend their single target removal on a creature that's worth less mana than the spell they have in their hand, right?
Zachary Jeblonski: you know And and and as the as a scholar New Horizons player, I am A-OK if you burn your single target removal to get rid of it. A-OK with that. Because I'm like, oh, cool. That probably means my bigger problems are going to be issues later on.
Zachary Jeblonski: Because in in that same game, or no, in a different game, I played i've played this deck, sorry, three times. I had Sun Titan go off.
Zachary Jeblonski: And I spent like three or four turns with a Sun Titan just attacking every turn and recurring and all that. So if you if you bring your single target removal on a Scholar New Horizons, that means my Sun Titan gets to live. A-OK with that.
ciderspence: Yeah, that's a... I hope that wasn't the same game. That's just a tough... I mean, you gotta deal one of them.
Zachary Jeblonski: Nah, Sun Titan was a different game. but I guess the last thing I'll say on this game, so I'll toss it back over to you, is I'm liking the play pattern of this deck. of like Quinturrius is a big part of trying of making the deck work.
Zachary Jeblonski: But he is not so crucial to the deck where i think out of two out of the three games, I've had him get killed maybe once or twice. And I just never cast him again. Like, it's fine. Like, the deck's functional without him, which is, like, it's a good place to be in when your commander decks are, like, oh, I like having my commander. It's a good synergy piece with what my deck's trying to do.
Zachary Jeblonski: But if if if he's if he costs more than he's worth, then then I'm fine without him. And that's kind of where I'm at, like, with him. It's just, like... Oh, you know, you swung your 2020 at him just to make sure he died. I'm like, Oh, okay. and At least I didn't take the 2020 to my face, you know?
Zachary Jeblonski: So, but yeah.
ciderspence: Yeah, I guess it' like maybe this is a through line that I want to talk about after the games, but like I feel like that's another pattern that I've seen a little more frequently. Or I guess maybe it's something that I remember from some of the games that have gone better for me is like having a commander that you're okay drawing fire and still winning without can be a real strength of decks.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah.
ciderspence: Even if you want to or need to get some value from your commander first, just being able to have it show up as a problem enough to deal with, I guess it's a an issue of like, sometimes with some decks stick to get to the finish line, you need to get rid of some answers because otherwise the answers can stop you from winning at the crucial moment and you know basically end the game for you.
ciderspence: And so it's nice when you have, especially a cheap commander, but a commander who can be problem who can show up and be a problem and can eat some removal that just gives you a better chance of, in a later game, going off without being interacted with.
ciderspence: I remember a game I played with Badric at a MagicCon, actually. And I played turn two or turn three storm kiln artist and it got immediately answered and think i won on the next turn but it was great because that storm can artist it wasn't like a decoy or anything that storm kiln artist was going to help me win the game but i think what ultimately helped me win the game was the fact that on the next turn there wasn't an answer for when badrick came down and i
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah, I can imagine.
ciderspence: played some other ritual-y type thing, but I was able to copy Shonda's Ignition or some massive burn spell a couple of times and burn out the table. And, you know, it was it was all thanks to Stormcone Artists. Like, if that card hadn't drawn that fire, Vagric would have drawn that fire, and I would have had him removed at a crucial point, and I definitely wouldn't have come back because the table would have seen what he was capable of. But, yeah, it's nice when you can deal, you know,
ciderspence: sometimes the threat is the answer so dealing with the threat by having something take the fire that it's okay for you to lose can be a really good position to be in with a lot of decks
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah, mean, it's it's, you know, it's that thing of, like, when everything's a threat, nothing's a threat. You know, like it's i like having I like my decks having a lot of things in it where, if you know, when somebody says, oh, but what if it gets removed? And I'm always, like, good. Because, like, that's one less removal for the thing I really care about, right? Like, yeah.
Zachary Jeblonski: And yeah, I think it's, uh, I think it's harder than ever, even for players like us or anybody, even new players or whoever, it's harder than ever to figure out what you're supposed to remove nowadays. Cause everything is so, everything can tilt the game so much in in an opponent's favor.
Zachary Jeblonski: and that's, know, that's kind of why I like, I, that's kind of why I've, I've really shifted off of, target to board wipes is it that it's just so hard to pick like the one thing that's the problem.
Zachary Jeblonski: I think in, I think on two separate occasions, since last time we've talked on the show, I've been in situations where somebody asked, Hey, what's the problem on his board has been mine.
Zachary Jeblonski: And my opponents couldn't answer that because there's so many problems. Right. you know, and I'm like, well, if you have a single target removal, what are you supposed to do? and I think it's just the answer is is like, unfortunately we've gotten to a point in the game where like, unless you're playing like bracket four or five, where you have a lot of single target removal,
Zachary Jeblonski: and that's kind of the way the game works. It's like board wipes are kind of the only way to handle things now because there's just so many things that need to be handled.
ciderspence: yeah and Yeah, it also feels like the case that it's also just really hard to not seal your own fate as losing a game by dealing with something with single target interaction.
ciderspence: Because even for the efficient single target removal, oftentimes by stopping or slowing down the person who's going to win, you are taking enough out of your own turn
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah. Yeah.
ciderspence: that you're just enabling everybody else to take a turn winning. One of the games that I'll talk about, i played a game with a new pod at my workplace, actually, which was pretty interesting.
ciderspence: And this was you know bracket three-ish. And so we had an elves player, we had a zombies player, we had a Ren and Ciri player, and I was playing my Misty Knight discard deck.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah.
ciderspence: and basically we had the elves player go off on turn three zombies player was kind laid back had some zombies on the board but no huge imminent threats and ren and siri player uh dropped some outrageous stuff by turn three like i think there was there was a parallel lives that got handled They dropped an Alluren on the next turn that let them play all their creatures with flash. so some just like Just like the type of thing that you see in a deck that is bracket three because it's not bracket four, but it's like, this could you know this deck could win on turn three or turn four.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah. Yeah.
ciderspence: Maybe not reliably, but you could definitely see a path by some of the cards that they played. But anyway, so the elves player announced it kind of nicely i mean i think this was maybe his first time playing with this group of players but he said i'm you know i'm gonna push to win next turn it was a friendly game like this wasn't a cvh tournament where like i think it cost him a chance to win although he ultimately did win later but it was a it was a very reasonable social decision uh but he got dealt with by the zombie player took out his commander took out a lot of mana production and then
Zachary Jeblonski: yeah
ciderspence: The Ren and Seer player went off, and then when we got back around, the Elves player was trying to rebuild, so he wasn't a threat that turn. And then the Zombies player dealt with... Oh no, Elves player started dealing with the Ren and Seer player, took out the Allurin,
ciderspence: and then zombie player was trying to set back up after taking kind of some turn some of his last turn and then i had a really brief window where my card the week showed up uh didn't win me the game but i had a chance in a game where i probably didn't deserve to have a chance but i think it was because both of two of my opponents had basically had a a chance to almost win the game and two of my opponents had taken some of their turn to deal with those opponents.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah.
ciderspence: And then I had a window where I hadn't really been interacted with. There was a board wipe, but I think the board wipe helped because I was pretty far behind. But after the board wipe, I played my card of the week. hammer it's archive. Five mana. If you would gain life, you gain twice that much life instead. If you would draw a card except the first one you draw, and if you would draw steps, draw two cards instead.
ciderspence: I think this card is actively bad. but
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah, I'm glad you said that. i'm I'm interested to hear your take on it.
ciderspence: But there's a window, and I think we were in another game where where this happened for some other player, and I said to you, oh, this is when you play that card. You play it after a board wipe.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yes, yeah.
ciderspence: there's There's no spot in a game that doesn't have a board wipe or a massive dead spot that you can justify playing carrying five mana to do nothing.
ciderspence: But if there is a spot in a game for some weird reason where everybody's setting up or there are no threats or like there's some effect where nobody can play creatures or creatures can't attack or something, this card can be massively impactful. So I'm playing Misty Knight who has this ability.
ciderspence: You can pay two and tap her and discard a card to draw a card for each card you've discarded this turn. And so she wasn't even on the battlefield at this point because board white, but the deck is built around discard.
ciderspence: I've got a few discard pingers in the deck, and that's those are my win con. I have to get one or two of those down and then just discard as many cards as I can. Well, one of the great way to discard cards is by drawing cards.
ciderspence: And so, you know, this card, if I can get it down, maybe I should look into Waste of Cheating and End or something, but like, if I can have it down, it's great because it, you know, basically doubles my discard in addition doubling my draws.
ciderspence: I've got a few instants and sorceries that let me discard my hand to draw either that number of cards or like draw four cards or something.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah. yeah
ciderspence: Anyway, I got to a point where I had just enough mana amplification, i think I had the Vision and the Scarlet Witch out that makes a red whenever you cast a spell, that I could start kind of churning through my hand. And so I had, you know, discard one, draw two, became discard one, draw four.
ciderspence: Discard your hand, draw that many cards, became, you know, discard that four and draw eight. I got to a point where i I was able to get a pinger out, and I...
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah.
ciderspence: discarded my way into drawing, don't know, 20 cards or something? And so i also had to leave. like This was at work, and I was playing after work, and I had to get home.
ciderspence: So I wasn't thinking all the way through the turn.
Zachary Jeblonski: yeah
ciderspence: i i could have almost won that turn. I didn't, and i I don't think I had an actual pathway to. I drew the cool bit rude in one of the card things, but I didn't quite have the mana to level it up.
ciderspence: That would have for sure finished the game. But I also forgot that you know I kind of announced, oh, I don't think I can win. Go ahead, take your turn. But I forgot the whole, you know, one of the, basic pathways to winning in that game is just ending your turn and then discarding down the hand size.
ciderspence: So I think my hand size was at 20 or something. So I could have dealt, you know, 13 or something to the table.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah, I...
ciderspence: Not enough to win, but that's, but yeah, i forgot about that.
Zachary Jeblonski: I...
ciderspence: Didn't matter. I couldn't have won, but
Zachary Jeblonski: I forgot. Yeah, I felt bad because the the turn I won with my Quintorius deck, it was like like partly through the turn of the next player because I forgot to discard my hand to hand size. And then when I did, Coolbert Rude killed them.
Zachary Jeblonski: I was like, o actually, I got discard to hand size, and that's 14 damage. So yeah, it was a little anti-climatic way to win a game.
ciderspence: Yeah, what are you goingnna do
Zachary Jeblonski: But yeah, that, that it turns out cool, but rude.
ciderspence: you going to do? You mean it was cool?
Zachary Jeblonski: Really good.
ciderspence: Yeah, it was it was indeed cool with Root is what you're saying.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah. All right. yeah. So on a homers archive, I mean, I used to jam that card in so many decks cause I was like, it doubles my life gain and my draw.
Zachary Jeblonski: Amazing. You know? but it's just, it got, it just got hard to play. It's really hard to take that five mana turn and do nothing else.
Zachary Jeblonski: But I do run the fairies ages inside all the time. And I think it's like, well, you know, well, Zach, is that like contradictory? And like, not necessarily, because I think the fairies ages inside being one manner less, I think makes a big difference.
Zachary Jeblonski: I think the difference between four and five is is kind of big. i had trouble getting a Hummer's archive down a lot of times, whereas the Fairy's Ages Insight, it's painful most of the time you draw it to to play because it's four mana, still do nothing.
Zachary Jeblonski: But it just i think it's just one mana cheaper. It's just enough to push it over the line. And kind of the one deck...
ciderspence: Yeah, i also think I also think that there's a difference in the types of decks that play those cards.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah, go ahead.
ciderspence: Because Tiberius and Agil Sunside has two blue pips, you need to be heavy blue in that deck anyway.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah.
ciderspence: And I find that oftentimes when you're playing heavy blue, you're holding up mana. to do stuff and most of that stuff is cheap so it's less likely that playing your taveri's ageless insight happens on a turn where you only have four mana it's much more likely that it happens on a turn where you have six mana and so you can play it and hold something up and depending on how the game is gone and how the table looks holding something up is pretty valuable in blue right like it might give you some tempo it might keep your opponents from trying to remove your thing and that might be enough to
Zachary Jeblonski: yeah
ciderspence: have you withstand taking up a lot of your turn, especially because you're able to still kind of threaten through other players' turns for the rest of that turn cycle.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah, exactly.
ciderspence: And there are ways to do that in artifacts. You could certainly play Alharmor's Archive in blue. Again, that one mana still makes a difference. But yeah, it's also the just the style of decks that would play it. It's not often the case, or it's not always the case in all colors, that you know you're holding up mana from turn to turn often. You're you know trying to use all the mana to deploy as many threats as you can.
Zachary Jeblonski: yeah Yeah, I think the i think the kind of the death knell for Alharmor's Archive, which I think I might run it in one deck. No, I don't, actually. i think the death knell was like when I couldn't even justify running it in my white-black life gain deck, when it literally helps with both sides of the life gain and the card draw.
Zachary Jeblonski: and But even there, I just i just couldn't couldn't pull it off because five mana is just too much. But I'm not saying it's a terrible card. it's just i think I think it's just limited in the places it goes.
Zachary Jeblonski: And I think like in your your red discard deck, it makes a lot of sense given card draws on the commander itself and the card draw is limited by your discard. I think it makes a lot of sense there. Yeah.
ciderspence: yeah mean it has Yeah, it has very high potential in that deck. It's very much a Feast or Famine card. like If you get it down, it might win you the game, but it might also immediately cost you the game. But I feel like that also is just in keeping with the kind of Mono Red's whole way of being.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah, I agree with that.
ciderspence: But the other thing i was going to say about it is this is also the type of card that's kind of a trap because it it does help you with card draw, but it doesn't draw you cards. So if the thing you need is card draw, this doesn't you know this if you know If you're allotting a certain amount of your deck to card draw, I wouldn't consider this because it is expensive, but it doesn't like if you need to draw some cards because you're stuck, this doesn't help you.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah.
ciderspence: Again, it really helps you in that case where instead of drawing cards, you want to draw a lot of cards, and you have other ways to draw cards. And some decks find themselves there. Like like you said, that mono red deck is perfect for that, because I have card draw on my commander. A lot of my spells are discard X, draw y So it's it's very helpful there. But it I think it seems more generically valuable than and it is. And I think I've learned that over the course of having it in and taking it out of a lot of decks.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah, I agree. Let's see. all right. and Any other games of note for me? I'm trying to think if there's anything too interesting. Oh,
Zachary Jeblonski: So I played a deck I hadn't played in little while, and I kind of had a realization at the end of the deck at end of the game was I played Samet, the Naya Samet from Aether Drift, which is a three red, green, white, you know legendary creature, human warrior cleric.
Zachary Jeblonski: She's got first strike vigilance and haste. She starts your engines. And I'll remind everybody what Start Your Engines is because I'm sure a lot of people have forgotten. Other creatures you control get XO where X is your speed. Non-creature spells you cast cost X less to cast where X is your speed.
Zachary Jeblonski: And Start Your Engines is its speed mechanic. You start at one and you all the way at four. And the way you raise your speed is by damaging your opponents on your turn. It can't be...
Zachary Jeblonski: any other turns. So the maximum you can, the fastest you can get to max speed is three turns. You know, you start your engines on turn one, you hit somebody on that same turn to go to so to two, and then you have two more turns of three and four to get the max speed.
Zachary Jeblonski: And this game, like, a lot of it was the kind of, like, you know, I kind of had the perfect hand set up. I had, like, three lands ramp and then two large X spells.
Zachary Jeblonski: And this game, this was, like, probably the most stompy game I've played in a while where I just kind of obliterated my opponents. And it made me realize something about this, which is, like,
Zachary Jeblonski: Witherbloom and Samet are kind of the same commander in a lot of ways. The play patterns are very similar. and I was, when I finished the Samet game, I was like, wow, that's exactly like it is when I finished a Witherbloom game.
Zachary Jeblonski: And it's interesting. they They kind of, they kind of operate in the same ethos. And and i think Witherbloom is better. I mean, like, I think, you know, but you could turn Witherbloom into bracket four, you could do all sorts of Witherbloom.
ciderspence: Wait, can you just just be explicit about how they're the same?
Zachary Jeblonski: But I think I've,
ciderspence: Because i i I feel like I have familiarity with both and I'm not seeing it.
Zachary Jeblonski: Oh, yeah, my bad. I kind of gotta got ahead of myself a little bit. So let's look at Witherbloom.
Zachary Jeblonski: So this is the new Witherbloom, the bouncer. He's six black-green affinity for creatures, flying death touch, in instant sorcery spells you cast half infinity for creatures.
Zachary Jeblonski: So his big thing is to drive down, give you a huge cost reduction in instant sorceries by just making a bunch of token creatures. Usually it's how you do it. And Samet gives your non-creature spells you cast X less to cast where X is your speed. So Samet applies to artifacts and enchantments, whereas Witherbloom only applies instant sorceries. So they're not entirely the same, but the play pattern is very similar, which is like build up whatever mechanic you need to get that spell reduction or cost reduction. So with Witherbloom, you're building up token creatures or whatever. And if for Samet, you're getting up to max speed.
Zachary Jeblonski: But once you're there, it really is just like play X spells or play large spells to close out the game. And they have a very similar feeling to them, even though what's ironic is they kind of are in completely different color pie situations. You know, she's Naya and he's Golgari.
Zachary Jeblonski: But the play pattern is very similar and I found that interesting. I didn't even it didn't even dawn on me when I first picked up the deck to play that evening that i'm like, oh, this feels just like Witherbloom. It's just a different style, but it's very much feels like Witherbloom.
Zachary Jeblonski: Does that make sense?
ciderspence: It does, but it's funny. We were talking about how single target removal is actively bad. Well, not actively bad, but it's questionable these days.
ciderspence: This seems like a case where maybe you just didn't get your Samet interacted with in a spot where it might have turned the tide.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah, i I, yeah, yeah.
ciderspence: Because Samet, I think what I've found about with the Bloom is that it's very resilient, right? Because it's the case that It itself also has affinity for creatures, so you remove Witherbloom, but you don't remove the tokens, then you just recast Witherbloom for still approximately free and you have the tokens.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yes, yep.
ciderspence: You remove the tokens and you don't remove Witherbloom, then your next turn you cast a spell to make tokens, and then you basically have all that mana back. So it really is... you kind of need a board wipe.
ciderspence: For Samet, I think what I've seen from her is that if you remove her, it's tough. because she's expensive and she doesn't have cost reduction. So even though she makes other stuff cheaper, you got to get her to stick.
ciderspence: And if she doesn't, it's tough to kind of reset.
Zachary Jeblonski: I think the advantage that... so but I think the Samet's got two advantages over Witherbloom, which is when you're at max speed, you there's no way for your opponents to remove that. So although you do have to recast Samet, which costs a lot of mana, you know, you instantly have that full reduction again, even after a board wipe.
Zachary Jeblonski: And then the other thing Samet's a lot easier to protect because you have white. There's a lot more white spells to keep her on the battlefield. But I agree with a bloom oh is overall stronger than salmon.
Zachary Jeblonski: so I guess, i guess the way to wrap up this list whole idea is if you want that feeling, that play pattern feeling of like big spells are cheap, but you think with blooms too strong, then I'll let me introduce you to with a bloom at home.
Zachary Jeblonski: Sam at the driving force.
Zachary Jeblonski: It gives you, a gi it scratches that same itch as well, I guess is the best way for me to put it.
ciderspence: Okay, I guess I get that.
Zachary Jeblonski: So yeah, it was, it was i mean, it was, you know, I acknowledged that I had the absolute like nut draw that game. Like everything went my way that game. Like, and I knew that was like, that's not always how it's going to go. Right. Like,
Zachary Jeblonski: I forget exactly, but I literally like not in response to a kill spell, but very quickly I either discovered or cascaded into mythical coat onto her. And I was like, all right, we're probably done here.
ciderspence: That's pretty good.
Zachary Jeblonski: Like, yeah, like there's nothing, you know, it's just like at that point, i was just like, all right, I had the one ring in my hand the whole game because it's the one deck I have it in because she gives at max speed.
Zachary Jeblonski: It's negative four for all non-creature spells. So the one ring becomes free. Yeah. So I'm like, even if I get blown up, I'm just going to one ring by a turn, replay all that stuff. But yeah, she's, she's real good. She gets going.
Zachary Jeblonski: So that is definitely a commander you have to kill as soon as you see her.
ciderspence: Yeah, I like how you said that. i I do feel like, you know, we kind of talked about in the past, I like playing underpowered commanders, especially new stuff. But it's nice to think of cards as, you know, an answer for a deck that you're having too much success with or you don't like the play pattern of.
ciderspence: Finding that or finding some of that that old good feeling in another deck or in another commander, I think it can be really fun for the health of your game.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah, exactly. Because sometimes it's like some commanders are just so broken that it's just really hard to play them, feel like you're having a good game, having a good time, and at the same time not be so broken that it's hard to play them with you know the groups that you normally play with.
Zachary Jeblonski: And I guess the last note I'll have on the, the Samet game is like, I, I did fill or not fill it, but I did add basically every ring, green, green white, red, and colorless land that I could that starch your engines, like just to get that going off as possible.
Zachary Jeblonski: And I kind of realized that like, i really only need to include maybe a few cards that are okay. Like there's a a red start your engines card that does a looting effect, which is fine. But I also included some really bad creatures to get that start your engines. I think I just need to take the creatures out. Like it's like one of those things where I'm like,
Zachary Jeblonski: If I wait till I play my commander or start my engines, it's not the end of the world. She has haste, so she can likely get in and get to that second stage second step on the on the first turn you play. And I think it'd be better if you if I swapped these like three bad creatures out for like protection spells or something like that. So I think that's what I'm to next with the deck.
ciderspence: Yeah, I think that's right. If you if you have evasive stuff too, like if you can just just making sure that the turn she comes down, if you can get your speed up to two, then at least you got a two turn clock. It it kind of helps to shape the game.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah, exactly. But yeah, do you have a do you have a game you want to talk about?
ciderspence: Yeah, I think I had two more to talk about. One of them is a game that we played together a few weeks ago.
Zachary Jeblonski: Okay.
ciderspence: So we played at a shop with a friend of ours who who we've been playing with more lately. And we've seen him play. We've seen some of his deck stuff.
ciderspence: But I think he hadn't picked up a win in our HomePod yet. Or maybe he had just picked up a win in our HomePod. But this was a night where He played two of his stronger decks, and he was kind of determined too odd to get some satisfaction.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah.
ciderspence: we had...
ciderspence: But it resulted in us having one of the more fun games I've played in a setting where i don't always enjoy the gameplay. So we're at a shop that has a very kind of, I would just say that some of the the players at the shop have a very particular set of skills personality-wise.
ciderspence: and
Zachary Jeblonski: We'll say raucous.
ciderspence: yeah and you know just it's not always to my liking but i've played with one of them a few times before and i i also just have found him to be a little uh
ciderspence: i think he seems to enjoy the game socially but not really be that
Zachary Jeblonski: That long.
ciderspence: engaged in the gameplay. But we we found ourselves in a scenario where in the second game, it was Sithis Harvest Hand was what our...
Zachary Jeblonski: Hmm. Okay.
ciderspence: Sorry, Zach, give me one minute. I got try to get my daughter some headphones.
Zachary Jeblonski: and That's fine. I'm going to continue the setup here for the listeners.
ciderspence: Sounds good.
Zachary Jeblonski: So, you know, our our our newer friend that we've been playing with more often, he wass playing Sithis, the Harvest Hand, i which is a, and I'm just going to spitball this for the listeners. I haven't looked her up, but she's a green-white nymph enchantment creature.
Zachary Jeblonski: Whenever you cast an enchantment spell, you draw a card and gain a life. She's an exceptionally powerful enchantment. She's probably the definitely the most powerful enchantment commander.
Zachary Jeblonski: And this deck was full of a lot of enchantment types of effects as well as lots of infinite combos in the deck. because We saw at least three or four of them throughout the game.
Zachary Jeblonski: And the gentleman that was playing from the store was playing Sissé five color kind of slop deck is what I would call it. And the theme of that deck is not combos. I don't believe there's any combos on deck, but definitely heavy interaction. so almost everything in deck is like has some sort of interaction to it.
Zachary Jeblonski: and i believe i was playing my Choco bird stack, which is a green, white, blue birds with Choco as the lead.
Zachary Jeblonski: there's some slight landfall synergies in there as well, but it's really just about the birds. And then Charles was playing a deck that I'm going to wait for him to come back to explain because I actually don't remember because the two games we play kind of merged together in my head and I don't remember which of the two he was playing. so I'm going to have him tell you that.
Zachary Jeblonski: But I'll take the wind out of his sails or, you know, take the game away from here. But it was, you know, our newer, our newer friend was popping off throughout the entire game.
Zachary Jeblonski: He was doing the thing, I guess is the best way to explain it. At one point, I think he had 124 angels. At one point he had, think it was like 90 health or so.
Zachary Jeblonski: But through the combined efforts of the three of us, you know heavily on the person that was you know part of the pod from the store,
Zachary Jeblonski: We were able to get him back down to a manageable level, even though, unfortunately, I think Charles was knocked out pretty early.
ciderspence: Yeah, I was gonna say I didn't, I didn't have much to do with it, but,
ciderspence: but yeah, i I feel like a lot of so the first big answer came from Zach, but a lot of the subsequent answers came from this other guy who you know is kind of a frequenter of the store we've played well i think zach has played with him maybe a time or two before i've played with him four or five times before and he's you know he's a fine person whatever he's very engaged in the store's generic or not generic but their general vibe that's not something that i'm that into so he and i aren't like especially compatible but i really enjoyed
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah, I've played with him several times. Yeah.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah. Yep.
ciderspence: seeing his enthusiasm for this game. Because at this point of the game where you know our pod mate had been handled, kind of, but was still a looming threat at any point, and it was clear that his deck had you know a lot of power, a lot of powerful answers, a lot of powerful ways to close it out, he really seemed to be enjoying you using all the resources he had. it like Basically, it seemed like his deck was a toolkit.
ciderspence: where he had one-off solutions for a lot of problems.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yes.
ciderspence: And so he liked the fact that our podmate was just throwing threat after threat after threat because it let him deploy solution after solution after solution. And like I said, I've played with him a few times and I've never really enjoyed playing with him before.
ciderspence: But it was nice to see him in kind of the type of game that I think he is excited to play. Maybe it's the type of game he's always looking for and he doesn't always get. Maybe it's the type of game that he's hoping for but never expects to get but it you know it had his attention it had his enthusiasm and the vibe was just really good you know for a collection of players that i haven't always seen the vibe be good for so i i really enjoyed getting to see him in that scenario and to see him in that light and you know i think it's a it's a fun thing to get to see a player in their element you know and uh just a reminder that you know
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah.
ciderspence: I don't know, there's some don't judge a book by its cover thing in there, but I don't think it's that. Like, I've i've played with him before, so I felt like I knew the book, but it's I guess it's a reminder that even even books whose covers you don't like have fun pages or something?
ciderspence: I don't know, like, it was just a...
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah. Yeah. Well, we we can keep that analogy going. Yeah. yeah
ciderspence: Yeah, i was say i I enjoyed that a lot about that game.
Zachary Jeblonski: No, I agree. Yeah, his deck is, and and my my red, black Valgaval deck is somewhat similar to this, where his deck is not bracket four. It definitely is not. and But it's it's almost been designed to take out bracket four decks, his deck is.
Zachary Jeblonski: where like it's just answer after answer after answer and it's a lot of answers for traditionally strong deck attributes like combos and stuff like that but when it comes time for him to close out the game on his own to actually like finish the game he that deck really struggles to do so and i and he's aware that he's voiced that he i think I think he likes the the puzzle aspect of taking apart everyone else's game plan, but that doesn't leave a lot of room in his deck for him to have his own game plan. I think it's the best way to to describe his deck.
ciderspence: Yeah, and I guess, yeah, and I think the way to like blend the two ideas is that when when he's not able to do that with his deck, I feel like his vibe is off.
ciderspence: like he He tends to talk and complain about other decks and you know just or be distracted by conversations and not really pay attention to the game, which happens to everybody when they're not engaged.
Zachary Jeblonski: Okay.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah.
ciderspence: But like I said, it was nice to see him engaged and active and having fun in a way that wasn't you know interfering with other players having fun. like It was just its just a good time.
ciderspence: like he was you know He was clearly doing what he wants his deck to do, which was it was just good to see.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, and ironically, that's the game that our new friend did not win or he won the first game, not that one.
ciderspence: Right. But I think he had a great time.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah.
ciderspence: i think he enjoyed they they both, and you know I did from the sidelines, and I think Zach did from kind of the popcorn seat.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah, I think so too.
Zachary Jeblonski: I was just trying to survive. i was just like, I'm here.
ciderspence: That's right.
ciderspence: But yeah, it was a fun, the tension in the game was was very entertaining.
Zachary Jeblonski: i agree. Yeah, it was almost kind of like on, it was, that was the highlight of the game. Me like eventually building up enough birds to win was just like, eh, like I can't even remember what I did. Like, but, but I do remember all the back and forth between the, the store person and then the newer friend.
Zachary Jeblonski: So I agree that that was definitely the highlight of that game. I'm trying to think if I actually have any standout games left to talk about. Oh yeah, we did have that third game, that really fast one.
Zachary Jeblonski: i played XL poison. i don't really have too much to say about that game unless you want to say something about it. Like I didn't really do much.
ciderspence: I don't remember it at all. I don't remember what I played.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah, because it was the the other, the the the the squad pod gentleman swapped out. The new guy probably played Marnius Calgar.
ciderspence: Oh yeah, that's right. What did I play in that game?
Zachary Jeblonski: You played something that was doing very well. You played something Bernie, but I don't remember what it was.
ciderspence: Oh, I think, okay, i think this I think I played probably, well, I guess I've got the two, I've got the discard deck that I talked about earlier.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah.
ciderspence: It might have been that one. It might have been Misty Knight, yeah.
Zachary Jeblonski: It might have been that one.
ciderspence: Yeah,
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah. No, I think it was Misty Knight that I think about it. Because you had conspiracy theorists going.
ciderspence: yeah because I think I had
Zachary Jeblonski: and That's what it was. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that went quick. Everyone died. i don't know. but We died to, we all lost to Marnius Calgar is what it was.
Zachary Jeblonski: I believe if I remember correctly.
ciderspence: Yeah, it was definitely one of those cases of not knowing what to, or not not knowing, but like there were a few answers thrown around and maybe not in the right directions. And then we just lost all at once.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah, basically, yes.
ciderspence: Yeah.
Zachary Jeblonski: That's the best way to put it. But yeah, I'm looking through deck list. i don't i do I don't have any other games to talk about. Do you have any about? I do want to approach something before we get to decks on deck.
ciderspence: Yeah, i have one more quick game to talk about.
Zachary Jeblonski: Okay.
ciderspence: So I played a new deck that I had just put together. This was another case where I feel like talking about the pod is almost more interesting than talking about the deck.
ciderspence: These are also games that I lost, so maybe I enjoy talking about the pod more in games that I don't win. I don't know. But the commander I played was
ciderspence: I know the name, I'm just trying to look it up before I get there.
ciderspence: The Serpent Society, it's a new commander from the Marvel set.
Zachary Jeblonski: Oh, the word poison counter one, I think, right?
ciderspence: Yeah, that's definitely a case. Okay, the Serpent Society, one, black, green, legendary creature, human, snake, villain with death touch, and ward, get five poison counters.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah, there it is.
ciderspence: Whenever another creature you control with death touch dies, each opponent sacrifices a non-token creature their choice. It's a three, four. I like this card. It kind of fits some of the things that I look for in Commanders, but I know it's scary looking and it involves poison counters, so I i was a little reticent to play it.
ciderspence: but I played it in a store with another friend I've played a lot with who kind of took a break from magic he's kind of slowly re-entering the magic space and he played up a deck I think the theme of it is like basically it triggers a lot off when your opponents do stuff and we're in a pod with two guys I played with at that shop a few times but
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah. Yeah.
ciderspence: It was just another case of like guys that I haven't always... It was just a case of the vibes being good and it in a spot where I've seen vibes not be great.
ciderspence: It was just like another exciting game where this game, I don't know, took a long time.
Zachary Jeblonski: yeah
ciderspence: like I had a lot of Death Touchers on the board. Everybody had something coming up. One of the players playing Yuma.
ciderspence: Something Protector? Desert Protector? i don't think it's Desert Protector, but he's a Desert Scamander. who makes a bunch of sand people tokens when you play deserts and discard deserts and something.
Zachary Jeblonski: Oh, what's his name? Yeah, I can't remember.
ciderspence: Crowd protector, you know, proud protector.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah.
ciderspence: And then my my friend the guy I played with before my friend, his deck was Kenrith.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah.
ciderspence: And the other deck was Cloud, I think. And Cloud ultimately took it down. but yeah we just yeah we cloud is good uh but yeah we just had like a it was just a fun game i enjoyed seeing my friend have a good time kind of back in the game so that was fun and then yeah this this poison guy was great were definitely some moments where i think the best thing i was able to do was a fight spell with a death toucher that killed one of my opponent's creatures this is it got down to one the one me versus the cloud player and he only had three creatures out
Zachary Jeblonski: Wow, that's good.
ciderspence: And so I had a fight spell, and I was able to fight a creature of his with a token to kill that creature and kill my creature and make him sac a creature.
Zachary Jeblonski: Nice.
ciderspence: but I didn't have another one to make him sacrifice cloud. So cloud was tapped. I didn't have enough damage on board to win, but he also fogged me. But if I had another spell, I think I could have made him sacrifice cloud.
ciderspence: So I think bye if I tweak this deck, that's probably the thing to add is just some more stuff that either lets me sacrifice my own creatures for value at instant speed or for really cheap or you know more fight spells to get that two for one. Because I think often it's the case that your opponent's best threat is going to be guarded you know buy hexproof or shroud or something.
ciderspence: And so making them sacrifice it is a way to get around that. So I think that's probably one of the strengths of the commander. But yeah, very fun game. So I enjoyed playing him from a poison commander, which I wouldn't have expected.
Zachary Jeblonski: That's cool.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah, no, I mean, uh, my continued hot take is poison is, is okay. Now it is not broken in my opinion. is I think what the speed of white commander is poisons, not what it used to be.
Zachary Jeblonski: Yeah. So i want I have a bit of a tangent to talk about. It's related to an interaction I had at the store Tuesday.
Zachary Jeblonski: so I always try to be inclusive, especially if players that are newer. you know I don't mind. I've taught several people how to play the game and all that. you know So I just try to have like spatial awareness of like if I'm in a pod, but I see somebody milling about, what's happening?
Zachary Jeblonski: you You know, just figure out, you know, ask them, especially if it looks like they're newer, they don't know what's going on kind of thing. And I was in a four pod. were getting close to kind of wrapping up a game.
Zachary Jeblonski: And there's gentlemen sat down with, and I've got the product up on my screen here. Marvel superheroes beginner box is we sat down with. And he was like opening it. He opened the packs. He was leaving it.
Zachary Jeblonski: And I was like, hey, man, you want to you want to play commander with us? You want to jump in? i don't mind jumping out. i don't mind going home a little early so you can have my spot, right? So just keep it a four pod.
Zachary Jeblonski: And he's like, he's really timid. And he's like, yeah, yeah, sure. okay. And I was like, all right. I was like, well, I can see him sleeving. So I was like, hey want just just hand me about half of those. I'll help you sleep before I leave so you can get in quicker. He's like, oh, okay, great.
Zachary Jeblonski: So he hands me them and I started sleeving it. And I'm like, wait a minute, there's duplicates. Wait a minute. what what What? I was like, hey, man, this isn't really a commander deck. like this you You need a commander deck to play commander, unfortunately.
Zachary Jeblonski: And he goes, what's that? I was like, oh, no. So was like, all right. I was like, do you know how to play magic? And he's like, well, a little bit. And I was like, okay. I was like, all right, well, I don't have time to fully get into it, but you can't play unless you have a commander deck.
Zachary Jeblonski: And was like, if you want, there are pre cons. And I pointed out on the shelf where they were and all that. But i think I wanted to say is like wizards, like if you're going to put the words beginner box on something on a physical paper product, and you know that the vast majority of magic that's played in stores is commander.
Zachary Jeblonski: put in a commander deck into this thing. Like, what are you doing? Like, cause I feel bad for this guy who buys a product that literally says a beginner box on it and he can't play the most popular format with it.
Zachary Jeblonski: I don't know. Like, am I crazy? Like thinking this this is dumb or like, don't know. Put up like a, a cheapo commander deck in it.
Zachary Jeblonski: Well, I think it was i think it was silly. Needless to say, I did recommend that he comes back next week and I will kind of help him get going.
Zachary Jeblonski: But on the extremely rare case that, on the extremely rare case that a Wizards employee listening to me, just include, you used to make like those commander decks that were like $25, just include one of those type of decks in there just so that people could get into a game.
Zachary Jeblonski: get into a game and you know, so yeah, I don't know. I just, I think it was just a bad experience for everybody involved and I think it probably made him feel not great.
Zachary Jeblonski: So, and then just one sec. But I think we're having some technical difficulties. So sorry about the pauses everybody.
Zachary Jeblonski: Charles, can you, can you hear me?
Zachary Jeblonski: Okay, I think unfortunately lost Charles, so I finished up the the story there. Maybe I'll rehash it again on the next episode, but yes, if you see somebody, Wizards, if you are designing a project called Big Gizzard Box, put at least one commander deck in there that is functional out the box, please.
Zachary Jeblonski: But after that, I think since unfortunately we ran into some technical difficulties, we're going to end a little bit earlier, so I'm going to go ahead and wrap this up. But I do want to thank Charles for joining me, even though he's unfortunately not here to say it, you know, to sound off himself.
Zachary Jeblonski: But we'll be, we'll come back on the next episode, which hopefully be next week. But you know, we don't call it midlife crisis for nothing. And you guys have a good week out there. Enjoy your magic. Enjoy playing the game. Remember it's a game. i know I have to remind myself too.
Zachary Jeblonski: And we'll talk again next time. See you.
