I would disagree. Archangel's Light, Increasing Ambition (the black tutor) and others have great specific use in EDH (Zombie Apocalypse for zombie decks, for instance).

Though, I can't really afford any new toys until the tax refund hits.

I still really dislike Archangel's Light, even in commander. Get rid of my graveyard? I need that! That's where all my stuff is. And the life isn't super relevant when I'm swimming in life anyway and a commander can drop me in a couple of hits regardless of my life.

Still very unclear on how good Increasing Ambition is. I've been playing around with Demonic Collusion as "unwieldy, expensive, sustainable tutor" and I don't think this is better than that. Or that I would need two of those. I very well could be wrong though, since it seems like it might be kind of hard to evaluate.

Zombie Apocalypse actually is pretty sexy in anything with a decent amount of black.

Binding Blade might be cute, but I'm not sure what you would put it in.

Both rare land are absolute auto-includes in anything that can run them, and Haunted Fengraf is maybe very good.

Crushing Vines is very good.

Grafdigger's Cage has a place in any deck that doesn't like to do the stuff it prohibits, but what deck would that be?

I got really excited about Griptide when I read "top" as "bottom" the first half dozen times I looked at it.

Jar Of Eyeballs is awful, but fits surprisingly well into a lot of mono-white builds.

Mystic Retrieval is kind of expensive and does things a lot of things do, but those things are strong.

Sorin is good. He's similar to Little Elspeth, and she's good.

AND THAT'S WHAT I THINK OF THE SET I GUESS YOU GUYS.

Forgot about Gravecrawler I guess. That guy is combotastic. I REALLY like Gravecrawler. It's another one of those cards that kind of makes me want to play Standard again. Might have to put some silly zombie tribal casual deck back together.

Huh. The traditional horror theme is what actually got me back into the game.


So, as in Heroclix, I really just want to have the biggest dude on the table. Does anyone have any suggestion on how to make Ludevic's Abomination or Elbrus, the Binding Blade actually work?

Fixed that for you. Of course, this is coming from a semi-retired player who mostly just ogles card art nowadays.

Ludevic's is easy.

Proliferate deck.

Thrummingbird, Steady Progress, and Inexorable Tide are all great tools.

the knife, well, just snag some unblockable creatures. A good, cheap one would be Tormented Soul. To get it out, well, just Dark Rituals, or a Tinker. Or any number of other artifact based things.

My friend that I would play against is pretty much only interested in standard, so Dark Ritual would be out. I'd have to look up some of the other cards you mentioned.

Thrummingbird is a 2 cost blue creature thats a 1/1 flier that whenever it deals combat damage to a player, you can add a counter to anything with a counter on the board.

Steady progress is a 2 and a blue cost instant that does the counter thing, and then you draw a card.

Inexorable Tide is a 2 blue 3 colorless enchantment that whenever you play a spell, you do the counter thing.

Proliferate was one of the big mechanics for Scars Of Mirrodin block, so they're all standard legal. As is the Tormented Soul, a common from M12.

Live the dream for Elbrus. turn 1 delver/phantasmal bear > Turn 2 delver/bear > Turn 3 Grand architect using his ability to play a wurmcoil engine > Turn 4 play elbrus with architect ability equip swing

I'm going to resurrect this thread to tell you guys about this crazy new format two guys at one of my LGS came up with. They call it "Split Personality", because the idea is to for both players to play the game using a single legal deck.

The way it works is you have 1 normal deck the likes of which a single player would normally use for themselves (60 card minimum, no more than 4 of any card that's not a nonbasic land, etc) and then both players use that deck at the same time.

For anyone interested in giving it a whirl, the specific rules that are important to help make it work:

1) You roll for start as normal, though at the beginning of the game, the player who owns the deck draws the first card, and then the two player take turns drawing one card at a time till both have a full hand of 7 cards.
2) All cards go into the same graveyard.
3) If the deck runs out, the first player who would have to draw from the empty deck looses the game.

I've only had an opportunity to play it once thus far, but it was definitely a different experience when both of us were drawing from the same deck and basically got access to every other card. I know I'm certainly going to try playing it again if I get the chance.

Definitely sounds fun. My amusing oversized mill deck would work rather well, as it's nothing but draw mechanics and such.

Don't forget everyone! Venser vs Koth Duel Deck came out last week!

i just started playing again and i am building a blue/black zombie deck right now. eventially i think i will build a black/white. but that will wait until i actually understand what i am doing.

If I waited to know what I was doing, I'd never build anything. : - )

True that. I wouldn't come up with amusing silliness like my Null Profusion-Rat deck, if I actually used my brain while deckbuilding!