The Wedding at Cana by Paolo Veronese (1562). Kozilek by Jaime Jones.
This weekend's blog post is going to touch upon some divisive issues, so if you are inclined to never, ever, ever want to see any mention of real-world political stuff in writing about Magic The Gathering, you might want to stop now.
I wouldn't want to offend your delicate sensibilities or trigger you in any way. Seriously. It's OK to stop reading this.
Today's post is about decks I've built that were designed to throw cards at people's faces. It's also about what I love about America and why I won't ever stop throwing shade at The Russian President (Trump, not Putin).
Throwing Lands
When I first really started getting into EDH, I stumbled my way onto a podcast named CommanderCast. I found two of the hosts particularly engaging - William and Calvin.
William was the guy who took over the reins from the previous folks who ran the podcast. He clearly wasn't the slickest podcaster out there, nor was he the best EDH player to ever walk the earth. What he may have lacked in some areas he made up for in energy, dedication and humor. Under his leadership, the podcast continued, and I somewhat identified with him, having been in the same role in my own life. I understood how important and how hard it can be to pick something up and work tirelessly to keep it going.
Calvin was the guy who played red, loved aggro strategies and professed to love Ashing the Pilgrim more than any other commander because you can play her with 99 mountains and still have fun. His sense of humor is decidedly off-color and for a while he was part of a group doing a podcast actually called the "off-color cast". He's also a person of color, african-american to be specific.
I even sent in a Purphoros decklist for the Commandercast team to go over in their "Goldfishin'" video series, and was thrilled to have them find my ideas interesting and novel enough to discuss. Click here to check that out.
My first few years of playing EDH were largely guided by the good folks at Commandercast, and in particular by William and Calvin. William actually came out as transgender during the time that I was listening to the podcast and eventually started going by the name Rachael. From here on out, I will be using her proper name. Rachel stepped away from the podcast and it stopped appearing in my iTunes download list. They still post on youtube, and while I'm sure they are still producing great content, I find myself listening to other podcasts these days.
Calvin and Rachel would talk about all kinds of things, but one thing that kept coming up was how much fun Borborygmos Enraged was to play.
For those not in the know, "Bobo" is an 8 CMC red-green legendary cyclops whose party trick is that he can throw lands in your hand at creatures and players as if they were lightning bolts. When he does combat damage to a player, you look at the top 3 cards in your library and put any lands into your hand. Presumably, you then chuck them at someone's head, or pick off some of their creatures if that is more advantageous.
At only 3 damage per land, and with such a high casting cost, I was skeptical, but eventually I broke down and picked him up.
I don't remember if I opened him in a booster or found him at a store, but given that I came into the game around Gatecrash, it's possible that I opened him. If I did, I clearly didn't know how much fun he would be until the good folks at CommanderCast had told me a half dozen times that he was a blast to play.
When I started building him, I knew I'd have a big challenge getting the mana to play him in a reasonable amount of time. At one land per turn with no extra help, he'd be on the table turn 8, if not later. That meant ramping, and I built my ramp with artifact cards like Gruul Keyrune, Gruul Cluestone and Thran Dynamo, along with Traveler's Amulet and Wanderer's Twig. I also put in lots of the more traditional green ramp spells with a focus on those that put lands in my hand rather than directly onto the field. With Bobo, lands are for playing and for throwing, so I figured that would give me early-game consistency and late-game lands to chuck around.
Because I was ramping I figured I would also invest heavily in red damage spells with X in their casting costs. The best thing about X spells is that they can be used early in a game for targeted removal and can be used late game to blow up and win if you have enough mana available. Fireball, Comet Storm, Burn from Within and any other X spell that could be used to do damage to a player were included, along with Mana Geyser as an extra way to make these spells hit hard. Upwelling was a natural choice to let me save up my mana over multiple turns.
There was a bunch of cards that were perfect fits for Bobo. Creeping Renaissance will return all cards of a chosen type from your graveyard to your hand. Praetor's Counsel will put your entire yard into your hand and give you no max hand size for the rest of the game. Abundance would let me choose the kind of card that I draw each turn.
The deck went through many iterations with lots of creatures getting a chance to prove their worth. I'm pretty sure Galvanoth, Guttersnipe and Young Pyromancer all got some play before eventually getting pulled out. Fire Servant and Hornet's Nest both stayed in, though I don't think I ever "lived the dream" of making Hornet's Nest indestructible and hitting it with tons of damage. Knollspine Dragon was a relatively late addition that lets you ditch your hand and draw cards equal to the damage done to target opponent that turn, giving you the potential to deal out a ton of damage over and above the combat damage you dealt.
The guys on CommanderCast were right.
The deck was a ton of fun to play.
For some reason, ramping like crazy and then chucking lands around is indescribably enjoyable. I even won a game once off of a Mana Geyser into Comet Storm with Fire Servant on the table burning out the entire table at once. Unfortunately, this was the time when my playgroup was getting better and playing more counterspells and boardwipes. Wins were rare, and were about to get much rarer. Late game, there was always a blue player with an answer for my Mana Geyser or Praetor's Counsel, and removal spells were flying everywhere.
The funny thing about an 8 CMC commander who gets countered or removed 4 times is that he suddenly costs you 16 mana to get back into play. In a mediocre playgroup that much mana makes it pretty hard to still be relevant at the table. When your opponents are getting better at playing and deckbuilding, it really becomes a problem. Adding in a Command Beacon and a few umbras didn't cut it - the deck was just getting less and less playable.
This was happening at the time that sets were dropping that gave me good new cards to include in my deck. I added Fork in the Road, Mina and Denn, Pyromancer's Googles and Slab Hammer, and they all helped in small ways. Unfortunately, I found myself less and less interested in playing Bobo.
It felt like a guaranteed loss every time I played it.
Part of the problem was that I really, really enjoy building decks.
I enjoy the problem-solving part of finding cards to work around a particular strategy. I enjoy the time when you still think this could be the deck that will hit the ground with a series of fun and strong games that force your opponents to work hard to find a way to deal with the new challenges you're throwing at them. I love that brief time when all the problems the deck winds up with aren't yet known, so you can think for while that maybe, just maybe, you've got something really amazing. My decks rarely seem to wind up being as good as I hope they will be, but I still love deckbuilding.
It should come as no surprise that it was easy to stop playing "Bobo" when practically every month or two I had new decks to try out.
I still tinkered with it occasionally, but "Bobo the Angry Clown" fell into disfavor. It's fun to thrown lands around like lightning bolts but good tables won't let you get away with that for long, and really good tables will have won the game by the time it takes you to become a threat. In the end, Borborygmos Enraged was a ton of fun and was eminently viable at a midrange table. Against stronger competition I found him lacking. That may just be evidence of how much more I have to learn about building a good deck, but whatever the reason he saw less and less play.
The deck is now retired, but you can view its last version at the link below.
Throwing Dudes
After CommanderCast stopped appearing in my list of podcasts available to download from iTunes, I started looking for new ones to listen to.
One of the first podcasts I got into at that point was The Mana Pool, with "Chewie", Mike, Brian and Dirk. They bring a sense of humor and fun to every episode that quickly made it one of my favorite MtG podcasts. Chewie in particular is just a joy to listen to. You should totally go check them out.
I also listen to The Commander's Brew, Commanderin' and Judgecast, all of which are fine podcasts and are well worth your time.
My favorite new podcast is probably The Command Zone, with Josh Lee Kwai and Jimmy Wong.
Before I continue, I'm going to go on a racist rant.
I grew up in Lexington, Massachusetts. Lexington is a diverse town and I was lucky enough to grow up with friends from a pretty wide variety of ethnic backgrounds. I grew up with good friends who were African-American, Jewish, Asian and of course of European descent (caucasian). For my entire life, I have always felt richer to have people from a variety of ethnic backgrounds in my life.
America is founded on some amazing ideas, and as a kid growing up in the town where the American Revolution's first shots were fired, I always took great pride in the fact that this nation is a melting pot. People from all over the world come together here, and I couldn't imagine it any other way.
Schoolhouse Rock - The Great American Melting Pot
I don't know Josh Lee Kwai and Jimmy Wong, but I've watched their videos - which are fantastic by the way - and I can with some assurance say that they seem to be of Asian descent. I won't pretend to guess what part of Asia they come from because that's beside the point. They don't look like me, a middle-aged white guy.
That doesn't mean Josh & Jimmy are immigrants, though I suppose they might be. Their forefathers probably didn't come over on the Mayflower, but they might both have family who has been in this country for many generations. I might have grown up in the town where "The Shot Heard 'Round The World" was fired, but there's no reason for me to assume that Josh and Jimmy don't know more about our country's history and founding principles than I do. Even if they don't that doesn't make them any less American than me. That should go without saying, but these days it seems worth writing out.
I don't know if young African-American Magic players are happy to be able to listen to Calvin, or if young transgendered Magic players were happy to be able to listen to Rachel. Rachel's last name is Hernandez, so it's possible there are Hispanic Magic players who enjoyed listening to a podcaster whose last name sounds like their own. I'd bet even money there are young Asian players who listen to Josh and Jimmy and take pride in hearing a fellow Asian-American talk about their favorite game. It's human nature.
In this day and age, that is worth more than I can easily explain in this blog post.
So what does this have to do with throwing dudes?
Somewhere along the line, after I stopped listening to CommanderCast, I heard some of these new podcasters talk about Brion Stoutarm. For the life of me I don't remember who it was, though my guess would be either Chewie & company, or Josh & Jimmy. I know for sure it was at least one of these fine podcasts, and it might have been more than one of them who put the Brion Stoutarm bug in my ear.
Brion Stoutarm throws dudes.
To be specific, he sacrifices creatures and throws them at a player.
I had pretty much stopped playing Bobo and one day while I was between projects I was going through rares at my favorite LGS and came across a foil Brion Stoutarm. I couldn't resist.
I used to throw shotput and javelin on my High School track team, so having a commander who throws stuff was always something I enjoyed about Borborygmos. It was time to give Brion a chance.
Building Brion would be very different than buiiding Borborygmos. At 4CMC, he costs half as much as Bobo and does damage equal to the sacrificed creature's power, so his "ceiling" for damage is much, much higher. Bobo throws lands at 3 damage a pop, but Brion is ripe for being broken wide open.
My first step was to take a page out of Purphoros and add in as many damage doublers as I could get my hands on. That meant Gisela, along with Dictate of the Twin Gods, Furnace of Wrath and Curse of Bloodletting.
The next step was to take a page out of my Padeem deck, which I'll have to tell you guys about sometime. Padeem runs lots of mind control effects. Brion is in Boros colors, so that means running cards like Act of Treason, Hijack, Lose Calm, Malevolent Whispers, Mark of Mutiny, Portent of Betrayal, Traitorous Blood and Unwilling Recruit. Yes - we're going to be stealing the biggest creatures on the table and throwing them at our opponents.
We also need our own creatures. Brion is a Giant so that makes Stinkdrinker Daredevil reduces the cost of Giants by 2, so he's an obvious card to throw in. I still had Giants left over from rework I did on the Kalemne boros EDH pre-con, so I threw in Borderland Behemoth, Boldwyr Heavyweights, Hamletback Goliath and Sunrise Sovereign.
The right combination of those Giants can do some work blocking and in a pinch can be tossed at an opponent for a decent amount. I also want to be able to hit an opponent through the air for an huge amount of damage, so I added in Malignus and Serra Avatar.
We're not playing patty-cakes with this deck. We mean to knock people out, and those last two will go a long way towards making that happen.
Firebreathing is a neat ability where you can spend mana to pump a creature until end of turn. The deck will want Mana Geyser, so I added in a few firebreathing creatures to pump like crazy to have another possible avenue to making a big creature. Immolating Souleater found a home in the deck, as will Moltensteel Dragon when I can eventually get my hands on one. Inferno Titan also gets the job done and helps with our Giant theme.
Taurean Mauler and Sunscorch Regent went into the deck because they can get pretty huge and if I play it right I'll be able to throw them at the player who tries to remove them.
I don't really want to be decimating my own boardstate just to throw creatures around. I mean... I'll do it, but if I can do it without losing blockers, that's even better. That's where cards like Flameshadow Conjuring, Flamerush Rider, Splinter Twin and Kiki-Jiki come in. If you're going to run Kiki, you also run Zealous Conscripts. If you're going to run those two, you might as well add the new Felidar Guardian.
We'll be gaining life, so we might as well add in Felidar Sovereign as an alternate win-con.
At this point we've got our main plan pretty well established. Creatures will be flying through the air, doing lots of damage and gaining us lots of life.
We still have room for some fun stuff. To get a whole bunch of creatures, I added Mob Rule and Mass Mutiny. To be able to sac the ones we don't throw when we've stolen more than one creature, Ashnod's Altar is an obvious include. Thornbite Staff will let us untap Brion each time a creature dies, so we can chuck as many creatures as we have available red mana.
Adding in Gift of Immortality means we can recycle one of our bigger bombs every single turn, so now I have a new bucket list item - kill a table by throwing Serra Avatar at each of them in turn before they can stop me.
As a nod to responsible deckbuilding, I added in Hushwing Gryff to deal with opponents reliant on ETB triggers. Ghostly Prison found a home here as did Swords to Plowshares. I don't habitually include every staple in every deck, but when I have one available it just makes sense. I still need to get Path to Exile for the deck, and should probably get some extras for other decks, as I don't think I own even a single copy of that little gem.
As a nod to whimsical deckbuilding, I added in Mobile Garrison. It will give me an untap trigger when the vehicle attacks. Sometimes that second throw is what you really need, especially after a Mob Rule or to finish off an opponent. It's a way to chuck two Eldrazi Titans when you really, really don't want to have to choose which one to give back to your opponent at the end of the turn.
The prevalence of indestructible creatures in EDH made Pariah's Shield another good card to add. Why steal an indestructuble creature and throw it when you can steal it, attach Pariah's Shield and give it back to them? Until that creature is removed, you don't need to worry about taking combat damage.
So far, the deck has been every bit as much fun to play as Bobo, the Angry Clown.
Brion won his first game, which was pretty sweet.
I've also had a game in which I was able to chuck a Serra Avatar and a Malignus in the same game. I wound up losing that one because Brion got hit with Faith's Fetters and I didn't yet have any answers for that in the deck. In the same game I used Mob Rule to steal an opponent's board, but was unable to do much. Needless to say, this was prior to the addition of Ashnod's Altar.
I habitually play different decks and generally cycle through 6-8 decks at any given time. I have only played a few games with Brion, but I find myself looking foward to playing him again more than any deck I've played in a long, long time. He comes down early. His lifegain gives the deck a level of resiliency that Bobo never had. I haven't even played a game with a damage-doubler on the field yet!
If you'd like to look at the full list for Brion, check out the link below. This is still in active use so it will probably change over time as I play and modify it.
http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/16-01-17-brion-stoutarm/
Throwing Shade
So today we're talking about throwing Lands, Dudes and Shade.
That may seem like an odd combination of things to throw. What exactly does it mean to "throw shade"?
Now is definitely the time to stop reading if you cannot abide mixing politics with gaming.
A few weeks ago I "threw shade" at internet trolls, gamergaters and the alt-right in my writing about Combo and the evolution of an EDH player.
For my trouble, I got lots of good and fair criticism from readers. I also got a visit from an alt-right "gamergater" troll.
We live in interesting times.
America is currently in the middle of what can only be described as a coup d'etat. It essentially began when the GOP chose to oppose everything President Obama would attempt to do, even if it was in the interest of their constituents or was legislation they themselves had originally thought up. Yes, you read that right - they opposed their own legislation in cases where its passage would make Obama look good. The obstruction reached its pre-election height when President Obama's pick for a Supreme Court Justice was not put up for a vote for the last year of his term.
This is not normal.
With Trump's popular vote loss to Clinton, one might have thought that the will of the people of America would place Hillary Clinton in the Oval Office. Trump's own sentiment from 2012 that the electoral college overruling the popular vote would be "a disaster for democracy" was prescient. The electoral college awarded him the presidency, despite one of the most loathesome, divisive and dishonest campaigns our nation has ever seen.
Trump is literally and provably a pathological liar, textbook narcissist, and racist with authoritarian tendencies and a clear lack of understanding in what is actually involved in holding the office of President of the United States. His lack of preparation is astounding. His lack of concern for anyone other than himself is breathtaking. His lack of self-control is disturbing.
So why did I throw shade at right-wingers two weeks ago in my blog post about Combo and the evolution of EDH players?
Remember Rachel, Calvin, Josh and Jimmy?
We are only two weeks into a Trump administration that has for its chief strategist a self-avowed white supremacist.
Their campaign was openly endorsed by the KKK, white supremacists and literal, modern-day Nazis.
In the wake of the inauguration hate crimes are on the rise as right-wingers feel they have carte blanche to act on their worst impulses. White supremacist groups have been removed from the US Government's terror watch list, and they are working overtime to enact a ban on Muslims. Mosques are being burned. Minorities are being attacked. LGBT and women's rights are at risk. The administration is openly spreading "alternative facts" (lies) and encouraging its supporters to only get their information from Trump himself, and not from journalists and other news sources.
We are truly through the looking glass, and despite likely foreign involvement in influencing our election and equally likely financial entanglements with said foreign power (Russia), the party in power (the GOP) has shown zero interest in the release of Trump's tax returns, the proper vetting of his cabinet, or the subversion of our electoral process by Vladimir Putin.
I completely understand why anyone in the greater EDH community would fail to include politics in their writings and their podcasts.
It is divisive and they will lose readers and subscribers.
They will get hate mail and angry comments. I already have and I only mentioned the alt right and gamergaters once.
These podcasters are making a sound and well-thought-out decision and I respect them for it.
They want their podcasts to be about Magic, and some of them have literally vowed to never talk about politics.
I can't do that.
There is far too much at stake for every American, and especially for gay, trans, black, hispanic, jewish and other minority non-white Americans. I haven't even mentioned the planned rollback of reproductive rights that women are facing if the Trump administration gets their way. This new administration does not represent the majority of Americans, was not elected by a majority of the vote, and seems hell-bent on doing everything they can to strip away our rights and increase the profitability of the businesses they are still involved in. Trump is already entertaining the idea of war with Iran and China and is openly joking about invading Mexico.
This is not normal.
This is not wise.
This is not safe.
Right now, the inmates are running the asylum, the trolls have come out from under the bridges, and the people who want to tear down our government from the inside are setting charges and measuring out the ignition wire.
I will continue to speak out against those who yearn to make this country all white, all christian, all cisgendered, all heterosexual and eternally at war.
I will do it for Rachel.
I will do it for Calvin.
I will do it for Josh and for Jimmy.
I will do it for the hundreds of thousands, if not millions of people who will lose their rights, and possibly even their lives in the wake of Trump's actions.
I will do it for my own pride in the amazing melting pot this country can be, and for the hope that the step backward we are enduring will be followed by two steps forwards.
They have not asked me to, and they may not want me to, but this blog is where I share my thoughts and whether they like it or not, I will do everything I can to put my weight behind shifting America back towards being a place where people of all backgrounds and ethnicities, all shapes and sizes, and all genders and sexual orientations can be free and safe to be themselves - and of course, to play lots of Commander.
While I will let you know at the start of each post when I am going to touch upon things political in my writing, I cannot in good conscience omit real-world concerns from my writings here. Hopefully this won't be every week, but it may happen more often than you (or I) would prefer.
Thank you for reading, and I hope if you ever build Bobo or Brion, you enjoy them as much as I did.
I also hope you at least think about speaking up for what you believe in.
Speaking up matters, and your voice is more powerful than you probably realize.
Please use it.