to start i would purchase 5 10th edition packs and enter a league when they are 4 weeks long again(should be happening soon). 10th edition is a great set for new players due to the fact its a very basic set and the players are less experienced.

I decided to try out a 10th edition league...like the poster above haven't really played in over 10 years. Tell me what you come up with to see if I'm on the right track. Seems to me that White/Black with maybe a splash of green for the 2 big creatures would be the best bet.

g/w/u
Green
OVERRUN!!!!!!!
spined wurm
enormous baloth
rushwood driad
pincher beetle
giant growth
naturalize
canopy spider
civic wayfinder
grizzly bears
White
Skyhunter patrol
Skyhunter patrol
Skyhunter prowler
bandage
bandage
Windborn muse
Blue
Snapping drake
Cloud Elemental
Cloud Elemental
Sky Weaver
Artifacts
Cromatic star
whispersilk cloak
Lands
8forrest
7plains
3island

Core set has a lot of defensive creatures, bombs, and common fat; don't put in weak creatures with no abilities/evasion unless you absolutely have to. Scathe Zombies and Spineless Thug are desperate filler in core set sealed (and playing them over Highway Robber is definitely wrong) and I'm not even sure tundra wolves is playable without any kind of pump. Millstone is probably a better card than Enormous Baloth; the format is really that slow, and this deck has all the tools to stall if it needs to. Suntail Hawk is meh. Holy Day is just awful.

You probably picked the right colors (black is deepest, and I think Windborn Muse > all the reasons to play your other colors), and you could splash the spined wurm pretty easily, while making it easy to board in Naturalize if you have to, off of just Llanowar Wastes and Chromatic Star.

My suggestions:

Out: Spineless Thug, Tundra Wolves, Suntail Hawk, Holy Day, Enormous Baloth (I might be wrong about this one; if I did play him, I'd want an 18th land though. Seven is a lot even in this format)
In: Millstone, Angelic Wall, Highway Robber
Mana: Swamp = Llanowar wastes, now you can cast spined wurm with no forests in your deck (2 green mana sources and several cantrips to draw into them)

For sideboarding, remember Naturalize. Also spirit link gains you life if you cast it on an opponent's creature, so you can consider siding it in against some decks if you have to. I'd be looking for excuses to swap out the whispersilk cloak since your creatures are so small and most of them have evasion anyway.

Black might be easier to splash than blue with the damage land. Essence drain, grave digger, assassinate, and recover in place of the 4 blue cards and 2 swamps and the dual land in place of the islands.

Ok, I'm not good at this, but I'm really trying to get better.

White: There's some playable cards in here. Plover Knights, Meadowboon, Lairwatch Giant, Changeling Sentinal, Goldmeadow Harrier, Kilthkin Zephynaut, Knight of Meadowgrain. The enchants are cheap (daily regimen and militia's pride - probably playable)

Blue: Sigil Chaser (nice ability to have for removal which I have a little in black/red/whirlpool), Latchkey Faerie, Dewdrop Spy. Couple others can make a deck - Turthleshell, Glimmerdust. (second color, but not great due to 2B spells)

Black: Pack's Distain, Nameless Inversion (good, cheap removal early in game). Warren Pilferers (handy), Moonglove Changeling + Winnower. Nightshade Schemers

Red: Pyroclast, Mudbutton Torchrunner (seems good, probably not worth the 'extra' turn), Blind-Spot Giant, Adder Staff Boggart. Shard Volley, Release the Ants, Roar of the crowd.

Green: Wren's, Winnower, Oakgnarl (too expensive), Leaf Gilder, Kilthkin Daggerdare, Hunting Triad, Earthbrawn, Fertile Ground, Elvish Warrior.

There seems to be some potential in every color, but nothing jumps out to me. There aren't any great end game cards. This pool seems very lacking for 'power'. The tribal interactions are pretty weak (Zephynaut, Pyroclast - too bad he'd kill almost all my possible creatures). So yeah, I'm overwhelmed. My first thought was White/Black with a splash of blue.

black 11
footbottom feast
warren weirding
peppersmoke
violet pall
cairn wanderer
dreamspoiler witches
ghostly changeling
hornet harasser
hunter of the eyeblight
squeaking pie
weed pruner poplar

green 9
earthbrawn
lignify
Bramblewood Paragon
elvish warrior
fertilid
Leaf-Crowned Elder
lys alana bowmaster
Lys Alana Huntmaster
woodland changeling

blue: 1

mulldrifter

gold:1

wort

artifact:1
obsidian battle axe


land:17
vivid creek
primal beyond
gilt-leaf palace
1 mountain
7 swamp
6 forest

Here you go:


black 11
nameless inversion
pack's disdain
frogotosser banneret x2
ghostly changling
moonglove changeling
moonglove winnower
nightshade schemers
sketal changeling
spiderwig boggart
warren pilferers

red: 11

roar of the crowd
crush underfoot
release the ants
shard volley x2
adder staff boggart
flamekin spitefire
mudbutton torchrunner
pyroclast consul
seething pathblazer
soulbright flamekin


gold: 1
wort

land:
8 swamps
9 mountains


You could replace a mountain with boggart birth rate for silly goblin shenigans but I figure you need the land more since you have 2x shard volley.

1-2 (could possibly be 2-1, didn't play real well in my second match).

First match, Cloak and Dagger/Flying Pesterlink (? flash 2/1 flyer) = Game Over.

Second match, first game - a few errors that definitely cost me second game - Plenty of burn, but no creatures. Hurly Burly killed my little 1/1 so Roar/Distain were useless. Using Shard early isn't the best thing either, so it was quick and painless.

Third match (2-0) Flying is good, 2x shard is nice to have in your hand with the guy that does 3 damage when put in graveyard.

The deck works - I'm not sure it's the best, but I'll finish my regulation off with it, then experiment some on my own. Anything big on the board is a real struggle. Haven't got any play out of Wort or Pyroclast yet.

I downloaded the program, and am trying to click on the link on the login screen that says "Click here for a Free Trial" but it has been telling me the servers are down since last night.

Are they down or is it a problem on my end, possibly a firewall issue or something?

Will the trial let me play a match against a real opponent? just trying to get a feel for it online before i start putting $ into it. I played the tutorial thing you can download of the site and it got me even more interested...is normal game play like that?

I think you can start a 'free' account that will let you play with the 5 theme decks against other players. The theme decks are tenth edition, mono color.

Don't quote me on the above. Don't remember the tutorial, but the game is pretty addicting (if you find all the characters/interactions interesting). The servers have been having some stability issues lately.

Rollin, you may have downloaded the Magic 3 Beta client which connets to the beta server, which isn't up, I'm pretty sure. Make sure you have the version 2 client.

top of the login screen reads "Magic Online V 2.0.105.2995"

is this the correct version?

also before i launch the program, is there something i may need to fix in the settings options?

Howdy,

I decided to give another league a go. Any suggestions this time around?



This deck seems to have alot more potential to me. The red/black both have alot of nice cards for removal and some good synergy with Thorntooth Witch, Wort: Boggart Auntie, Stinkdrinker Daredevil and Frogtosser Banneret. Any suggestions?

Dire,

You're definitely running RB with this deck. White is enticing but a lot of the key cards have WW in the casting cost. I think this deck almost builds itself really. Inversion, Eyeblights, 2x Shard Volley, Tarfire, and Pack's Disdain is a nice removal suite.

Here's what I'd run:

Creatures (15):
2x Frogtosser Banneret
Moonglove Changeling
Oona's Prowler
Skeletal Changeling
Thorntooth Witch
Taurean Mauler
Seething Pathblazer
Mudbutton Torchrunner
Fire-Belly Changeling
Changeling Berserker
Pyroclast Consul
Hearthcage Giant
Wort, Boggart Auntie
Stinkdrinker Daredevil

Spells (8):
Nameless Inversion
Pack's Disdain
Eyeblight's Ending
Tarfire
2x Shard Volley
Makeshift Mannequin
Release the Ants

9x Mountain
7x Swamp
Mutavault

Dire that pool is absolutely ******ed + make your money back on mutavault.

I'm not really sure what I'm doing wrong, or if there's just an ass ton of luck in leagues. I've gone 0-4 with my incredible deck. Twice I was up against mostly blue decks with just **** tons of counters and 'ambush' flash creatures, and the other time I was against another black/red deck but his cards were sicker - had some artifact that made it where his attacking creatures took zero damage, some planeswalker with sick skills (+1 = 1 damage to target player, -x = x damage to target creature, -10 = 10 damage to target player and all his creatures) and he also said he had 10 removals, etc..

When facing blue do I just never attack if he still has mana or what? I just don't know what's going on. It's kind of frustrating.

Dire you can definitely be playing bad.

You have to kind of read what your opponent is doing. Like lets say for examples sake:

His turn 4: drop land # 4, say go.
Your turn 4: you drop a land and have a 2/2, but decide he might have the 2/3 flash faerie, so you dont attack. he does nothing at the end of your turn.

Now on your turn 5 you can definitely be sure he doesnt have the faerie, as he would drop it at the end of your turn if he did.

Its like hand reading in poker, you have to read into his actions and interpret what to do.

Yeah, thinking about that it is most likely the case that I was playing poorly against the blues. I was mostly just playing my cards and bitching if things didn't work out. I think I'll try to get in alot of matches and work on my play. Too bad this will probably be the last league for a while. I really am starting to enjoy this.

I agree with this, but there are also aspects of chess. With wrong attacking and blocking moves, or just poor spell order you could be really playing your cards wrong. You need to sometimes think turns ahead of time to make the correct play. Inexperienced players often don't attack enough or make poor trade offs. They also tend to use their removal cards prematurely instead of waiting for a troublesome creature to use it on.

I think I'm definitely doing pretty well my removals, but it's something I've had a number of my opponents do poorly with. But I'm curious about the not attacking enough. This is something I definitely might have a problem with. Could you elaborate? Like a typical scenario or something?

You need to be constantly attacking and never missing damage. With this comes a lot of trades. You want to try and make mainly good trades. So attacking with a 5/4 into a 4/1 is a bad idea, but generally you need to look every turn and figure out all the possible attack and block combinations. You need to think if you attack with each creature how will he block. This will obviously change for different attack combinations. Card advantage is obviously very important. The more times you trade 1 of you cards for 2 of his you will get ahead, but sometimes it is worth it to give away a creature to deal more damage. For instance if I have 6 creatures and he has 3 it might be worth trading 2 of mine for one of his to get 6 damage through from the 3 unblocked creatures. Being aggressive pays off because a opponent with a low life total has to begin making bad trades to conserve life points, such as a "chump block" which is blocking with no trade. He also has to focus more of his resources on defense and less on offense allowing you to commit more resources to offense.

Yeah that makes sense. I think I tend to let things build up too long especially for my current deck where I don't really have a whole lot for the endgame. I've been waiting too long to find spots where it will be 'decisive' when it sounds like just gaining the initiative can be a whole lot more valuable.

I don't know anything about your deck but if it has a lot of removal or card advantage(most good decks do) you want to make lots of trades and not let creatures build up to compliment your good cards. A 2 for 1 creature kill spell is a lot more effective when you both only have 2 creatures as opposed to 6.

Dire,

Your deck is definitely built towards the aggressive side. You want to get in as much damage as possible with creatures like Oona's Prowler, Fire-belly Changeling, and Changeling Berserker so that you can deal the last bit of damage with Shard Volleys or Wort recursion.

You have very little evasion so the only way for you to break a stalemate is to draw a lot of removal and punch through early or perhaps have a game-saving Hearthcage Giant late. I've never seen someone lose a game after resolving that guy.