Anselm VS Alex 4! Rival Battles

5 Suprising Limited Cards

Now, I must admit, I've been a bit silly. When I first thought to write my article on limited, I was going to go over what each of my packs gave to me and why I did what I did. But I may have accidentally mixed up all the cards, so that options out of there. Instead, I'm going to write about 5 cards that stood out during the event, mostly in my deck but also a few elsewhere.
Think Twice
I must confess, I didn't have to think twice about adding this card to the list. It's just so good for puns! And disregarding that it's still pretty awesome. Looking at the spoiler it's just a card I skimmed past, but in game it was simply brilliant. It gave you something to do with your mana, and if you had a bit left over gave some nice card advantage along with it! Sadly counterspells were few and far between in Innistrad, and I only pulled one, but decided not to use it due to restrictive conditions. Thus there were very few shenanigans you could play with this or that instant. But I certainly look forward to the mana leak and Think Twice "combo" so you get advantage from your opponent whatever happens. I was not sure if I was going to go blue before, but now I want to so I can play this card!
Splinterfreight
I really liked this card going into Limited, so was happy to see it in my pack. I still liked it coming out. But during... No. I may have made a mistake to add him in alongside the blue zombies so he rarely had a target, but I can only remember playing him twice... as a 1/1 and a 0/0(I really should have checked first...) So in limited, he probably aint the perfect card to be playing. But he's still pretty fun.
Snapcaster Mage
Like Splinterfreight, I had high hopes for this going in, so I was very happy to see one on my pack. Yet in limited, unless your fairly lucky he just don't shine. Most of my instants either had flashback themselves or were not ideal targets. I can see he's going to be awesome in constructed across the formats, but in limited he really does not meet the mark. Still, having that flash can make him useful, so hes probably a good addition anyway - just not nearly as good as he should be.
Villager of Estwald
Less this specific card, but werewolves in general. I was at first sceptical of how Werewolves worked, but I can now say that their mechanic is awesome. I found myself playing one, and missing a go gave me a beastie, and it's harder to deal with that you may think, either over-exert yourself or deal with it. And the missing a go don't really matter much either, being able to think twice during your opponents turn and then play another card on yours. I look forward to seeing more of these guys, and although with ponder and the like making it easier (I imagine) in constructed, it's something to look forward too.
Bloodgift Demon
My final card comes with a story. I was playing the last round. I was 2-2 so really wanted the win. My opponent mulligan'd to five, and I felt a bit more confident. Then they went to four, and I was like... this is bad. For me. I don't know why, but going down that low implies you kinda know what your doing. So he continually hit his land drops until T5, when he had a 5/4 flyer, I had no removal, and no way of dealing with it. So he slowly drew all those cards back and regained his loss, eventually winning the game. So it's brilliant for this format, if I didn't want one so much I'd consider first picking over Garruk. Maybe when I get my play set of that. On a side note, in limited I never get any removal and my bombs tend to not go further than Vastwood Gorger, so I'm not too lucky in that sense - I just get mythics after. I think I came about 37th/57, not my best attempt but still pretty good for a first bash at limited.
I hope you enjoyed the article. Finally, a shout out to Ollie, who is a Powerful Planeswalker!
See you next week... and may the Heart of the Cards be with you for that!.

Fridays post - A Warhammer video!

Anselm VS Alex Rival Battles 3

Top 5 Fun Combos

Hi, and welcome to this week’s edition of Magic Monday. Now, I must confess, the actual content of this article is quite in contrast to the title. It should really be “Top 5 combos that have randomly happened in a commander game without intending them to, but hey, it just happens and is fun when they do.”… But that don’t have quite the same ring to it. You also probably would have dozed off by then from title alone. So pretty much, these ain’t the best combos in the world, but its just some I’ve come across through commander, regular, non-combo decks, that are great fun. More mini-combos than game winning, but still fun, and that’s what matters! (I must also note these are in no particular order.)

1:
Conquerers Pledge + Nomads Assembly
















Now this one should be fairly obvious. Get a BUNCH of tokens with Pledge, hopefully kicked, then quadruple that number for a very scary field. Not quite as cool or as unobvious as what’s to come, but it really made me grin whenever it comes to light, so I had to include it.
2:

Kresh the Bloodbraided+ Momentous Fall + Praetors Counsel


Now, as anyone who’s seen Kresh in all his might would know, In a relatively short amount of time during a commander game he can go from 3/3 to a monster, certainly commonly over 20 power. Combine this with Momentous Fall is nice by itself, as you can respond to a removal spell by drawing about 20 cards, leaving your opponent down a card and you up by many, without a difference to your field status (seeing as a Kresh Commander deck can’t really run any counters.) But oh no! You’ve gotta discard it all at the end of turn  So your opponents may be annoyed at a large improvement of card quality, but the best has yet to come. Out of the blue, Praetors Counsel can bring them all back and prevent your end of turn discard, so suddenly you have an absolutely massive force to be dealt with. The best thing is, if you wanted to, you could make this fairly consistant. There are loads of cards that can allow you infinite hand size, from Venser’s Journal to Relinquary Tower. If you chose to take enough, it would be a reasonable guess that you could pull one from the 30 or so cards you can draw. I’d almost consider it, but I’m already strapped for card space 
I’ll also note that Soul’s Fire can slot nicely within this combo, but not an essential addition.

3:

Liquimetal Coating + Unwinding Clock + Mirrodin’s Core(?)

The next combo is not one I executed, but rather a friend who I’m sure would rather remain nameless. I’ll call him BearDylan for the sake of argument. Anyway, Mirrodin’s Core requires you tap it for a charge counter, which in exchange can be exchanged for any colour of mana alongside another tap. This can be a good card by itself, but can also deprive you of mana when you really need that certain colour. Not anymore! Liquimetal Coating can turn Mirrodins Core to an artifact during an opponent’s upkeep, allowing Unwinding Clock to untap it, ready to tap before the next upkeep again letting you get another charge counter, pretty much meaning you have whatever colour mana whenever you want it. The scary thing is this is quite tame application of it. The charge counters amassed, but once youre past 3 or 4 it’s going to make little difference. At first I didn’t really like Liquimetal Coating, but now I must confess I see its potential in this combo. You could combine it with other cards like Imperious Perfect to amass a token army in a few turns, Royal Asssassin to really push off that big attack, or tap out your opponent with a Stun Sniper or Gideon’s Lawkeeper to prepare for your big attack. It’s a nice thing to get, and could really help out. Heck, at worse it allows you to give a creature pseudo-vigilance, which aint all that bad!
Also, as I posted this I thought of another alright combo to add on. Combo with Rakka Mar and Ancient Den for plenty 3/1 tokens for free :D

4:


Animar, Soul of Elements, Inexorable Tide, Garruks Horde

Another combo not at home with myself, but someone who seems less bothered about other people knowing he enjoys himself, Alex. This combo can work in a variety of ways, but these 3 cards seemed to epitomise what it entails. Animar makes people cheaper to cast every time a creature is cast, Inexorable tide then makes him more powerful and also makes creatures even cheaper. Combine this with Garruks Horde and having cards in hand does not become an issue. Animar also renders the need for mana almost needless. With a lucky set of topdecks you can quickly amass an army of powerful creatures from nowhere. The abudance of Bloodthirst in this deck only adds fuel to the cause, creating a monstrous army… and you can even combine this combo with planeswalkers to create either sheer survivability or access to a planeswalkers ultimate the turn it enters play. Scary stuff!

5:



Fleshbag Marauder + Butcher of Malakir+ Nim Deathmantle

Nasty combo. Start out with Butcher of Malakir and Nim Deathmantle on the battlefield, late game, when you have lots of mana open, preferably 15. Play Fleshbag Marauder, and sacrifice itself to force each opponent to sacrifice a creature. As this happens, Butcher of Malakir kicks in, forcing another sacrifice. But then you active Nim Deathmantles ability, returning your Fleshbag Marauder to the battlefield, and the cycle continues while your opponent has creatures and you have mana. With the 15 advised, That’s 6 creatures. This is the point to say Grave Pact would work just as well as Butcher of Malakir. Now destroying 6(in a typical 4 player game) opposing creatures is obviously nice, and even gets past shroud and indestructible and the like, making it an even better deal for the cost of a single card. However, the most fun part comes in an optional bonus – Kresh the Bloodbraided. With this little combo your getting +13/+13 alone, ignoring what everyone else sacrifices. Assuming there are 3 players left, and they all sacrifice 6 1/1s(giving scope for people having less, more powerful creatures) that’s still a total of +31/+31, Enough to take someone out with Commander damage now they have a blank field. At that’s probably being too generous. Thanks to this little combo I had Kresh end the game with over 100 +1/+1 counters on him… That’s fun.

4 things that don't make sense about Warhammer 40'000

Warhammer 40000 has quite an complicated rule system to master, with a rulebook of essential information spanning over 100 pages. Yet, with all that detail, there are still things that don’t make sense or are missed out. Now, I’m not going to comment too much on specific rules (such as wound allocation) in a balance sense, but much more in a fun way that you will surely find out soon. Like, now.

1. Grenades
Now, I don’t know about you, but over my time as a (video) gamer I have experienced quite a few shooters. Not nearly as many as most of you, but enough to know vaguely what I’m on about. Now, don’t get me wrong, but quite often I’ve used grenades to, y’know, kill people. They are pretty effective at throwing, and if you’re caught close enough, instantaneous death. Yet Warhammer allows for no such possibility with its most common grenades, frag and krak. You may use these on vehicles, but why not men? They have strength values, it’d be fairly easy to imagine a 6” range with a 1D6 scatter. Now you could argue that in most of these shooters are generally far more lightly armored than you average combatant, but I disagree. Take the imperial guard – they are about the same. It is hardly realistic to believe if some Space Wolves came across renegade guard they wouldn’t consider throwing a grenade. Frag to same point is represented in that it can draw enemies out of cover, but it has no chance to kill, regardless of whether you even consider krak. I think it silly I can’t do this, as it really does make sense. If I can blow up an armored transport with this grenade, has no marine really considered throwing one at a mob of orks instead?
2. I’m close to you… I miss.
The battles raging. Shots are firing everywhere. A missile shot renders that speeding Land Raider immobile, a lucky sequence of events. Even luckier, theres a tactical marine with a meltagun nearby, so close that he could practically touch it without so much as a step forward. He takes aim, at a massive chunk of metal, unable to move. Aaannd… he misses. It’s happened to all of us at some point. For some reason, this chosen warrior out of 1000, trained to the finest art of combat, with potentially thousands of years of experience, misses such a shot. How does that make sense? I understand the rules in most contexts – it does indeed represent a moving battlefield. A unit has moved 6” last turn, and even though it appears to be sitting on the tabletop, down on the battlefield it’s still in motion, only reaching it’s destination in time for your next turn, so obviously I an allow some discrepancy for shooting a moving target, even if the models themselves are barely an inch apart. What I cannot stand is that my battle-hardened veteran could miss a huge, immobile, chunk on metal from so close. Its baffling. Did he forget to pull the trigger or something? Did he not notice the massive, roaring beast as it approached? Was he simply too busy reading a text to take aim? They all sound a bit silly don’t they? And so does this interaction.
3. I’m a battle hardened space marine. Trained and blessed by the emperors embodiment, I am ready to fight and kill any enemy. Into combat I charge… but wait, a lowly ork grunt has more attacks than me? Crap.
Now really. The vanilla marine book sees a tactical marine with a measly one attack, and no close combat weapon to bolster his power. WHY? An ork grunt, even when holding a shooter, bolsters two attacks. I get they live to fight and all, but this can be represented by low cost, furious charge, and an option to have close combat weapons. That my regular marine cannot put out as much damage seems ridiculous to say the least. And the main problem is that, for some unknown reason, the imperium can’t be bothered to give the majority of their fighters a bloody knife. You’d think these sacred warriors would all at least have something to deal with hand to hand combat. Even in the (logical) case of the Space Wolves, where each man does indeed have the brains to carry a chainsword, they are still matching these orks holding a shoota. I personally don’t like the whole feral feel of Space Wolves, but I play them because they seem to be the only chapter to add logic into their battlegear choices. Building on that, but a bit of a digression – they can take special weapons in units of 5. Ironic how they are the most tactical of tactical squads and they don’t even bare the name, having to run around in units of 10 for a single melta is a bit underwhelming. And, y’know, you think a TACTICAL squad, able to fill any role, would carry around the bare basics to take part in 1/3 of the game. But that’s more mechanics than anything. Anyway.
I’m actually being kind. Every player should know the flavour behind marines. Each man is indeed amazing in their own right. They could arguably swing the tide of battle with a lone soldier, and a whole squad could take down an entire army. But I know for gameplay this does not work without going to movie marine levels, and I accept that. What I disagree with however, is how you play the newly released Space Marine. You find yourself ambushed by a horde of Orks, at least 30. Yet with a bit of tactical thinking massacring them all is relatively easy. On the table top however, it would take all of two seconds(depending on how fast your opponent rolls) for all of these to just die. I understand gameplay balance, but such a change as this really is a bit too far. Especially seeing as most troopers ain’t learned to carry around a flippin close combat weapon in 40’000 years.
4. Our unit has taken more casualties than intended – we are down to six men. We are currently being chased down by a Chaos Rhino. In my hand I hold a meltabomb and to my left a Power Fist – but our meltagun took a casualty. If we can face this foe, we can easily crush it. But we running away from a threat we could easily take out. Why? Orders from above. Why? Not a clue.
It’s got to have happened to everyone. At least marines have some leeway – they can survive under half strength, which is both useful and flavourful. Other armies may not be so lucky, but most also lack the faith in their leader to get them through, no matter the odds. So again, this will focus on Marines. I understand tactical retreat, but the aforementioned situation is possible and has probably happened in a similar situation to every marine player. I can understand running for it when you’re facing down a Carnifex – indeed, again shots can be fired which is probably the most human-like response to deal with it. But when the threat lies in a flimsy vehicle – or in some cases, a lone guy lucky enough to survive shots, it’s a bit ridiculous. I don’t believe an actual space marine would not attempt to at least throw that damn meltabomb at the vehicle at he’s running, but even more likely would a marine feed the Rhino a Power Fist. But nope, they keep running. This rule is more of a situational nitpick, as they are indeed human and will be outright scared and flee from time to time, but Marines could have some sort of last stand move – they can assault the unit chasing them, but if they fail to at least win combat that round they meet an untimely end. This is hardly the best solution as it is pretty illogical versus a big beastie or even a moderately sized squad, but a lone Rhino sees little reason why, in the battlefield we want to believe, this is not possible.

I’m sure there are many more silly situations you can think of, but this is my top 4. Let me know of anything far more illogical!

Anselm vs Alex Pokemon Platinum Rival Battles! Round 2

Time for Wednesdays pokemon battle! Enjoy!