#MONOBLUE

[usausa-art]

chu💕

[grubblemunch]

Baral, Chief of Compliance

I LOVE COUNTERSPELL TRIBAL COMMANDER! I LOVE 3 HOUR GAMES! ASK ME FOR PERMISSION BEFORE CASTING ANYTHING

[beatsandskies]

Beats and Skies does a bracket. Pool 1, Week 8. Semifinal 1.

Just one of the semis in this post, I think. I’ve managed to write quite a few words on it!  Match 29: Dominator vs Migrane Monoblue vs Monoblack. Stronghold vs Exodus. Aggro Control vs Control Control. I’m not going to do another summary paragraph on each deck again: there’s already three examples of me saying the same thing in a slightly different way! My initial thought is that Migraine has…

[paupermodern]

PAUPER MODERN NOV. 4TH, 2023 - 11 Players - FAERIES TAKE 1ST - Jared

Ten of the best pauper modern players on earth gathered at my home on a sunny Saturday, and I somehow prevailed! I took the crown for the first time after being runner-up at many a Pauper Modern tournament.

I piloted mono blue faeries after running mono blue terror last tourney, and Kiln Fiend in tournaments past.

I used insider information to get the edge in the meta. I utilized a phishing scam to learn Rob wouldn’t be bringing his synth deck and removed two Annuls from my sideboard. I saw Todd walk in my door and tossed in two copies of Tormod’s Crypt. I gave Chris COVID by sending infected customers to their new job, so I knew their storm deck wasn’t as likely and therefore Echoing Truth was less valuable. 

Here’s what I settled on: 

Faeries:

4 spellstutter

4 seer

4 miscreant

Ninjas:

4 deep hours

4 moon circuit hacker 

Others: 

2 brinebarrow intruder

4 spire golem

Spells:

2 preordain

4 lorain revealed

4 counterspell

2 vapor snag

2 mutagenic growth

4 of one mind

16 islands

Sideboard: 

2 echoing truth 

2 annul

2 mana leak

2 vapor snag

2 snaremaster sprite

2 tormond’s crypt

2 spell pierce

1 bonesplitter 

Match 1: Todd - Mono U Serpent

First match I was paired up against Todd and I was thankful I added the Crypts. Last tourney we were both slapping our serpents around, so I was excited to see how the faeries would do against this T1 powerhouse. The first game was absolutely insane. Todd played Delver turn 1, though he didn’t flip it until turn 3. He got two serpents down at one point, but I Vapor Snagged one of them back to hand and had enough faerie babies to sacrifice - like Andromeda - to the remaining serpent. I was at 1 life and the serpent was eating up my faeries while the Delver defended the sky. I then drew into my final Vapor Snag and bounced the insect. With only a few faeries, it seemed I didn’t have the juice to get him down to zero, but I had Perseus’s will on my side! My faerie swarm flew over his snek and ninjitsued into Moon Circuit Hackers, dealing exactly lethal.  I was at 1 life.

Game two I was expecting the same butthole-clenching action, and boarded in 10 cards, taking out Miscreant, Brinebarrow, Mutagenic Growth, and two Spire Golems. Unfortunately Todd got two no-landers in a row and had to mull to 5. I Crypted turn 3 and when the faeries finally won he had three serpents stuck in hand. 

Match 2: Ben - Jeskai Ephemerate 

I welcomed Ben to his first tournament at my house. He borrowed one of Brian’s beautiful decks with gorgeous lands and shiny creatures, all contained in a deck box neatly-labeled “Jeskai Ephemetate.” First game Ben played Cleansing Wildfire and pretty soon was way ahead on lands. Still he didn’t play an Ephemerate and only late in the game got an Archaeomancer out before the faeries ate his entire life total one tiny-mouthed bite at a time.

Game two he Cleansing Wildfired what felt like all of the basic lands and still couldn’t get enough to slow down the faeries. He tried to teach me the “Kill Spellstutter when it ETB to reduce the number of faeries and therefore make Spellstutter fizzle” trick, but I refused to learn! Still with only 12 creatures, there weren’t enough bodies to stop the fated faerie fish (Mulldrifter) feast. After our match we played for fun and Ben prevailed.

Match 3: Brian - Goblin Combo

The first time I met Goblin Combo (https://www.moxfield.com/decks/6blWcj57AECqd6RZ7HQAnA ) I was confused and terrified, like my cat. “Infinite mana!?” I asked. Brian explained the insanity of First Day of Class and its interaction with Putrid Goblin. I was going to learn today - first day of class indeed. Game one I tempoed him out even though he Bolted my first Faerie Seer.  Still I feared the combo. I realized the only thing to fear is Putrid Goblin resolving, so I boarded in Annul, Spell Pierce, Mana Leak, and the remaining Vapor Snags.  Brian played Unearth so I boarded in Tormond’s Crypt.

Game two I was on the hunt for Putrid Goblin and countered one and subsequently Crypted it into oblivion. Another Putrid Goblin resolved after Brian foiled my Spellstutter’s counter attempt by blasting it after ETB (a lesson I refused to learn from match 2). I made a play error by discarding to hand size Annul rather than Spell Pierce, which allowed Brian to resolve Makeshift Munitions and zap my faeries at instant speed. Brian’s combo resolved and I took infinite damage.

Game three was ultimate buttclenching. Thinking I had forced him to board out the Unearths with Tormond’s, I switched the Crypts for Mutagenic Growth to save a ninja from Bolt or finish the game slightly faster. Brian was stuck on 3 lands and couldn’t make it happen, and I was on to the final match. 

Match 4: Taylor - Boros Synth

Another newcomer was Daniel’s cousin Taylor who was 2-1 when we met in match 4. We discussed what would happen if he won and were both 3-1. Would the computer decide that he defeated me in the “final” and therefore is the champion? To frail humans like myself this is the appropriate outcome. However in prior tournaments, the algorithm determined the match loser was the tourney winner. We deferred to the machine. For faerie pride and to ensure the algorithm didn’t steal my glory, I knew I had to prevail. It was man versus machine, appropriate for the matchup against Synth.

My opponent was a hilarious shit-talker who borrowed my version of Synth (read: Rob’s deck). That same deck that took gold last tourney piloted by Cyrus. Taylor switched the Lembas for Ichor Wellspring and added Kuldotha Rebirth for the Batterfists.

Game one Taylor landed a turn one Swiftspear and started the assault. He showed the Wellspring and the Rebirth. I showed Mutagenic Growth to take out a Kor Skyfisher with a faerie early to instill fear of the free combat trick for the rest of the match. Brinebarrow Intruder did real work taking out a Glinthawk with a Ninja of the Deep Hours. Narrow victory, much buttclenching. Boarded in Annul, Mana Leak, Echoing Truth, Spell Pierce, and Bonesplitter for the Vapor Snags, a Growth, an Island, and the Miscreants.

Game two again a turn one Swiftspear. I persevered but eventually was Synthed out in a grind.

Game 3 I got ahead on land after denying some Synth shenanigans, and the Golems took over the game. Taylor proclaimed, “Spire Golem for free - the best words in Magic.” I agreed, and clouded the air with Golems despite two going on Journeys to Nowhere. I became undisputed champ in both human intuition and machine logic. 

Epilogue

I, like Oberon, have ascended to the faerie throne. However it was a hollow victory, as I brought a T1 deck against the mind-boggling brews of my comrades. Still haunted by Rob taunting, “Your net deck is showing,” when modern-banned cards popped up in my Pauper Modern decks, I am hopeful to prevail with an original brew. Until then,

 The King doth keep his revels here tonight.

[onebulbliteatalltimes]

I HAVE NO REPONSE

Yesterday in a four person game of commander, I attack with my 13/13 ashaya, 8/8 rampaging baloth with bear umbra, and my 16/16 multani.

My opponent casts cyclonic rift.

I said “ok…you know that does nothing…”

The looks of confusion across the table and then the sudden realization of my opponent’s face was worth it.

[dravidious]

You're more amazing than P

Was thinking about collars so I killed my fursona again ELIAN LIVES FOREVER!! Also noticed a distinct lack of monoblue Elians

[bunnygirlheart]

wow so isshin doubling mishra triggers good?

playin that all access brawl event n i cobbled together an isshin deck cuz that sounded fun? attacked with myrel and a yotian frontliner to make 6 1/1s, (sadly losing both to their jin and kairi) then next turn i would've attacked with the 1/1s to drain 12 life, or everything to drain 16?

I did get a lil lucky though, they cast impulse w/ their jin doubling it and somehow didnt find an answer in the top 9 cards

[markrosewater]

You should have lined up things so the secret OG Ravnica draft archetype was blue black ;)

Can you talk a bit about that secret izzet archetype?

It was blue/red as there was only one guild with blue (Dimir) and only one guild with red (Boros). To balance the colors, there were more monoblue and monored cards. I believe it was a tempo oriented archetype combining the blue control cards of Dimir and the aggressive cards of Boros.

[thegreatyin]

mr veils plays monored aggro or an infuriating minigame heavy deck where it takes 45 minutes to finish a turn and you need to keep track of 2.357 mechanics depending on its mood.

mr pages plays monoblue.

mr stones doesn't play mtg but it has all the very rare cards in a vault somewhere

mr hearts plays grixis

i have the feeling the scoundrel is an annoying combo player. Caeru plays monoblack because he's an edgelord

[littjara-mirrorlake]

oh you play blue? name your favorite pathetic queer coded monoblue mind magic twink with a one syllable j name

[allhailklisz]

decided to finally jot down my half baked phyrexian oc concepts and also give them names (which I made basically by just ramming random phyrexian phonemes together, seeing what syllables I liked, and then trying to anglicize them by vague analogy to the praetor names and to the correspondence of φyrx-phyrexian itself)

Iphiqua (^’yφq.)

Formerly a priest of the Machine Orthodoxy, the sort who could recite the entire Argent Etchings from memory. Became disillusioned with the Orthodoxy for [reasons to be decided later, it’s not like there aren’t options] and has defected, and is now the sort of jaded ex-religious type who never misses an opportunity to make a jab at their former faith (frequently quoting the Etchings right before flagrantly violating the quoted verse, that sort of thing). Has deep-seated self-hatred because of having once been a tool of Norn’s, but is simultaneously in deep denial of this.

Chovex Parsk (^čovx-paʁsk.)

Dissident Gitaxian, who has come to emphasize the whole “anyone can become anything they want to be” bit of blue’s ethos – still wanting everything to progress in the process of perfection, but also believing that perfection itself is fundamentally subjective, and thus opposed to involuntary compleation purely for monoblue reasons (rather than the red-based empathetic reasons that Urabrask and his sort have for their own distastes for such).

[usausa-art]

✌️🍑🍏

[homeostasister]

I would love it if anyone who knows both Magic the Gathering and I Was A Teenage Exocolonist wants to add their own takes, but here are my ideas for the main 10 IWaTEx characters’ color identities:

Tang: blue/black at first, monoblue later

Dys: green/red

Sym: green/blue, with maybe a splash of red

Cal: monogreen

Anemone: monored at first, red/white later

Marz: red/black/blue

Tammy: monowhite

Nomi: red/blue

Vace: black/red

Rex: white/red/green

[fellwar-finch]

So once again I am hankering for a new magic deck, but this time I think I know what I want.

Since my days of Yawgmoth I’ve liked having card draw on my commander, I’m literally the only person in my play group who gives a shit about card economy, and since building urza lord protector, I’ve found nothing gives more of a rush than casting one of those ‘pay x, draw x’ cards for a discounted cost.

So why not just like,,, commit.

So I bring to you an early draft of my new jin-gitaxias deck:

Don’t know what deck name I’ll go with, think it’s a bit shy on ramp, and can’t afford some of the more pricy shit that should go in here, but here he is!

The black and white one is one of the coolest card art I’ve ever seen, wanted to build him since spoiler season on art alone but didn’t think I’d like monoblue. But I was testing with urza about a half hour before typing this at 2 in the morning, and I found not being able to draw cards reliably with like 12 pieces of card draw to be super stifling. And there’s one remedy for that.

So here’s to value, long live the progress engine.

[bigboysdrinkmilk]

Which of your Commander decks is your favourite and why?

That’s so hard 😭 like asking my favorite child

But, as I’m a monoblue player at heart:

Followed closely by Minn as a second favorite:

[thecornwall]

Cornwall’s Random Card of the Day #539: Charix, the Raging Isle

Charix, the Raging Isle is a rare from Zendikar Rising.

Truly this is a Leviathan Crab. It has a sort of proto-Ward ability on it, cause WotC was finally realising Hexproof sucked at this point, and also a weird-ass ability to give it +X/-X until end of turn where X is the number of Islands you control. I feel like this works best in decks which are two colour, since if you go monoblue and have this, eventually the ability may turn this thing into a 16/1, or, more reasonably, a 14/3, which is pretty easy to take out. Combine that with the no evasion this has, and it’s probably not as cool as it looks. That said, it DOES look cool, and sometimes that’s all a rare needs to do.