Magic the Gathering Arena

[Ranselknulf]

I see lots of people playing the "Learn" mechanic, but I'm still on the fence about how "good" it is. I can usually just power through a person spamming "learn" spells and defeat them.

depends on deck really. Its nice that you can fetch whatever you need in given situation. Usually that is limited to tutor land/removal/spawn creatures.
Works ok in wizardry package, cant say its op in constructed.
Limited is different beast though, mastering them is crucial

I could see "learn" being fantastic in limited. Any time you can get a card advantage on a person in limited its good.

Last time I played limited was around 2016. I enjoyed the FNM drafts at the card shop. It might be fun to try those again if I can find a proper non-woke card shop.

 

[[UCHIHA]XxDarkSasuke420xX]

learn is ok in limited unplayable in standard

 

[Newfag-er]

Learn has seen play in Naya Winota also I have seen some green black decks using various pest summoning cards

Tho the mechanics itself isn't the center focus of the deck. Having a learn sideboard does have upside especially in best of 1

In my opinion they could've powered up the mechanics more. This mechanic is way more interesting then adventure

 

[Jason Liang]

The ban is Thassa's Oracle.

https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/news/may-19-2021-banned-and-restricted-announcement

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

The ban is Thassa's Oracle.

https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/news/may-19-2021-banned-and-restricted-announcement

Rip. I like Thassa's Oracle in theory but it really did open up a whole can of degenerate worms that weren't as much of an issue on Arena until now. Plus Jace is there for marginally more reasonable self mill, like Luka brought up.

 

[lukaszek]

thassa biggest issue was 'or equals' part of phrase. Invalidated so many answers.

almost singleton deck and yet its so consistent. Also got somewhere in their deck answer to everything possible. I had one matchup with my discard heavy deck when I managed to take opponent down to 10 cards. Still managed to resolve combo eventually.

Its cool they keep pact. I like the idea behind this as a tutor. Also muh wildcards

 

[lukaszek]

I saw some comments that its still turn 4 win:
- round 3, opponent end step fire pact and leave 1 card in library
- play and fire jace

basically forces you to have instant speed walker removal... which might not be that easy with Jace packing 5 loyality as his ability is put on stack. For example vraska contempt is 4 mana, too slow if you are on the draw. Most infuriating thing is how oracle-pact deck puts crucial pieces in sideboard too, making it impossible to remove with stuff like ego. Jace is also wishable while oracle wasnt.
Ashiok erasure could work but it is a bit too slow now. Just carry counterspells I guess
Ashiok dream render would be quite fine if not for enemy searching their sideboard too.

Basically just play historic rogues and you will be fine
EDIT: hmmm... havent played proper dimir control in a while. Rogues spoiled me

 

[lukaszek]

n other news strixhaven brawl(end of may) will award claim the 1stborn, best looking jap art in my view

Spoiler

you didnt hear it from me but many jap alt arts look good, obviously no reason to get them since you shouldnt be playing them anyway

brawl will also offer adventurous impulse, weird art for green, like if artist thought he is doing black or black/green

 

[Jason Liang]

The deck loses Lurrus with Jace. Also casting Jace consistently on turn 4 puts a lot of restrictions on the mana base.

 

[lukaszek]

The deck loses Lurrus with Jace. Also casting Jace consistently on turn 4 puts a lot of restrictions on the mana base.

thats why it sounds more fair and why I was hoping for only oracle ban to see where people take this

 

[lukaszek]

they add spider queen in and then... its this?

seem weak for 5 mana cost

 

[Gyor]

AFR Legendary Creature Drizzt has been reveal, he costs a green, white, and 3 colourless mana, and he has double strike, etb gets you a legendary 4/1 token of his cat Gwen, and when a creature dies, if ut had greater power then drizzt, add the difference to Drizzt in 1/1 counters.

Lolth is revealed as well as a PLANESWALKERA, she has card draw at the cost of life for zero, -3 to create 2 spider tokens with menace and reach, and her -8 is an emblem that when you deal combat damage to an opponent, if the total damage is less then 8, add the difference to the the damage.

Battlehammer is a Dwarf Warrior that grants +2 power to equpited creatures. He can also use equipt for zero mana.

 

[Ranselknulf]

Free rare wildcards :D

I don't play Thassa's Oracle, but apparently I have three of them.

 

[Bara]

Why is Lolth a planeswalker and Tiamat isn't when they're both gods?

 

[Jason Liang]

Lolth being a planeswalker kind of makes sense, since she appears as a deity in multiple planes/ settings (i.e. both Oerth and Faerun). But then Tiamat also appears in both settings.

D&D's ontology lore and mtg's ontology lore are kind of incompatible. In D&D anyone is free to travel from one plane to another (or to a demi-plane like Ravenloft) if they have access to the correct magical or technological means. Whereas in mtg only planewalkers are able to move to different planes.

 

[Gyor]

Free rare wildcards :D

I don't play Thassa's Oracle, but apparently I have three of them.

I got a wild card too, so that is awesome.

 

[Gyor]

Lolth being a planeswalker kind of makes sense, since she appears as a deity in multiple planes/ settings (i.e. both Oerth and Faerun). But then Tiamat also appears in both settings.

D&D's ontology lore and mtg's ontology lore are kind of incompatible. In D&D anyone is free to travel from one plane to another (or to a demi-plane like Ravenloft) if they have access to the correct magical or technological means. Whereas in mtg only planewalkers are able to move to different planes.

Tiamat's physical (none avatar) body is imprisoned in hell currently, so she can't travel between planes, although her divine spiritual power and presumably her Avatars can move around just fine, as this imprisonment doesn't effect her ability to grant spells to divine spellcasters.

 

[Gyor]

Why is Lolth a planeswalker and Tiamat isn't when they're both gods?

Tiamat's physical (none avatar) body is imprisoned in hell currently, so she can't travel between planes, although her divine spiritual power and presumably her Avatars can move around just fine, as this imprisonment doesn't effect her ability to grant spells to divine spellcasters.

 

[Thac0]

they add spider queen in and then... its this?

I don't think it is that weak, that is one hell of a passive. Even if you go -3, you need at least 2 unblocked damage to kill it. If you have two blockers laying around you need 3 unblocked damage. Very hard to kill through combat damage. Wouldn't surprise me if it is at least tried in the sideboard to win sticky creature based matchups.

 

[Ranselknulf]

they add spider queen in and then... its this?

seem weak for 5 mana cost

Seems fine for a green black deck. (Mana ramp is faggotry)

It also seems easy enough to take out also.

There are a lot of two cmc removal cards for planeswalkers. I've been testing these ones out in anticipation of the standard rotation.

 

[lukaszek]

they add spider queen in and then... its this?

I don't think it is that weak, that is one hell of a passive. Even if you go -3, you need at least 2 unblocked damage to kill it. If you have two blockers laying around you need 3 unblocked damage. Very hard to kill through combat damage. Wouldn't surprise me if it is at least tried in the sideboard to win sticky creature based matchups.

i meant ult. Weird ult that seem weaker then her other 2 abilities

 

[Gyor]

they add spider queen in and then... its this?

I don't think it is that weak, that is one hell of a passive. Even if you go -3, you need at least 2 unblocked damage to kill it. If you have two blockers laying around you need 3 unblocked damage. Very hard to kill through combat damage. Wouldn't surprise me if it is at least tried in the sideboard to win sticky creature based matchups.

i meant ult. Weird ult that seem weaker then her other 2 abilities

Her ultimate is unusually easy to reach in the right sacrifice deck, so they made it abit weaker. Its still dangerous, if one of those spiders hits with the emblem up, that is over a third of an oppenents life god, and in Commander you can do it to more then one at a time.

 

[lukaszek]

did some jumpstart number crunching and it gets on my nerves... 38% of packs are ensured to offer something new to me. 18% is useless white trash. 13% I am complete, 29% is mixed bag when i can either get duplicate or cool mythic.
In other news I got 23% chance to be sad when presented with 3 packs. 25% to fizzle on ICR...

So i guess my expected value is 3 rares instead of 4 per entry. Thats 666 gold per rare and most cool stuff I already have
all of this isnt taking into account pack nor icr rarity so its likely much worse

 

[Scruffy]

I can't wait for this garbage standard to rotate. Anyone who thought mill or cards like the ultimatums were a good idea needs to get fired.

 

[Scruffy]

This event. It could be fun! One could try and come up with some funky stuff, some synergies, etc.

Instead, it's another event of decks filled to the brim with removal and nothing interesting happening.

People are boring.