All the time. I’d play every single day if I could. I mostly draft, but I also play some standard, commander, and participate in sealed events like the prereleases. Now that the Onslaught fetch lands are being reprinted maybe I can actually afford to start playign modern.
Fresh batch of spoilers today for Khans, a lot of juicy stuff. In particular, I think Goblinslide (Enchantment 2R. Whenever you cast a noncreature spell, you may pay 1. If you do, put a 1/1 goblin creature token with haste into play) and Deflecting Palm (Instant, RW. The next time a source of your choice would deal damage to you this turn, prevent that damage. If damage is prevented in this way, Deflecting Palm deals that much damage to that source’s controller), along with the previous-spoiled Howl of the Horde (Sorcery, 2R. When you cast your next instant or sorcery spell this turn, copy that spell. You may choose new targets for the copy. Raid: copy the spell twice) can plug into a Boros Burn strategy and keep it viable post-rotation.
And now the whole set has been spoiled. Aside from support for Boros burn, I’m liking the sound of this interaction:
Sidisi, Brood Tyrant 1BUG 3/3
Whenever Sidisi, Brood Tyrant enters the battlefield or attacks, put the top 3 cards of your library into your graveyard.
Whenever one or more creature cards are put into your graveyard from your library, put a 2/2 black zombie creature token onto the battlefield.
**Nyx Weaver **1BG 2/3
Reach
At the beginning of your upkeep, put the top two cards of your library into your graveyard.
1BG, Exile Nyx Weaver: Return target card from your graveyard to your hand.
Necromancer’s Stockpile 1B Enchantment
1B, Discard a creature card: Draw a card. If the discarded card was a Zombie card, put a 2/2 black Zombie creature token onto the battlefield tapped.
Nice little zombie factory there, and it’s on curve.
Wait, seriously? Nyx Weaver? As in the same card that was just in Journey into Nyx?
Edit: My mistake. You’re speaking interactions and I thought you were posting that as a spoiler 
I think the Sultai Brood’s the worst clan. Delve is a mechanic that gets worse the more you have, because there’s only so much graveyard to go around. Outlast almost had this problem, but then they threw in a bunch of cards that buff every Outlast creature.
Sorry if it was unclear.
Looking at the Khans set, black seems really, really weak, and the awful Delve mechanic is a big reason why: because they are so overcosted, it’s useless in the early game, and as you say, unlike with something like Threshold, the mechanic is only good for a couple plays before the yard’s empty again.
The other reason black looks so bad is the lack of removal. There’s Hero’s Downfall and Bile Blight from Theros block, but beyond that it’s all terrible, either too specialized (Feast of Dreams, Dark Betrayal) or overcosted (Flesh to Dust, Sip of Hemlock, Spiteful Blow, In Garruk’s Wake, Murderous Cut, Throttle). Apparently Doom Blade was OP. Instead, white gets the quality removal: Banishing Light, Chained to the Rocks, Devouring Light, Pillar of Light, Suspension Field, Kill Shot, Last Breath. I know mono-black was pretty dominant the last couple years, but this is quite an over-correction.
Outlast also seems pretty meh (it’d be ok if it was instant speed or didn’t require you to tap), but at least it combos nicely with all the heroic stuff from Theros; the Outlast cards that buff (like Abzan Battle Priest and Ainok Bond-Kin) don’t care if the counter got there from Outlast or from something like Phalanx Leader.
I don’t play anymore, but I buy 4 packs from each new expansion and open them up to see what I get.
I was a huge fan of Alara so I had high hopes for Tarkir. The set reads like it will be fun but my nitpicking self is still bugged a bit by the fact that they didn’t creatively center the Clans on the color whose enemies form the wedge.
Oh, so this is the wedge-colored block we’ve been waiting for? Are there any new tri-color lands?
Yes, same as the alara blocks ones. ETA tapped, can tap for 3 colors. Note that this is a wedge set only, not block. The second set is likely colorless focused.
Supposedly there’s going to an explanation for that later. But I don’t really care, the wedges don’t really have any reasonable flavor, so no matter where you centered the wedge it was going to have some problems.
So the Khans pre-release was this weekend. I did decently, 5th of 20 with Jeskai on Friday, 10th of ~40 with Mardu on Saturday. Anyone else play in one?
I suspect that the Mardu Midrange deck Brian Braun-Duin has been testing, featuring Sarkhan, Butcher of the Horde, Despise, and Mardu Charm coupled with Theros/M15 All-Stars Bile Blight, Hero’s Downfall, Goblin Rabblemaster, Chandra, Elspeth, and Thoughtseize will be pretty dominant. It tears your hand apart in the early game, kills any mana acceleration or early threats, then wins with Sarkhan, Elspeth, or the Butcher.
Sadly, I don’t think the R/W Burn archetype I was going to try to nurse through the rotation will be viable, there’s just too many 4+ toughness efficient creatures, too much easy lifelink (including the Butcher, who is stupidly good), no Chandra’s Phoenix-esque repeatable threat (except the fairly lame Flame-Wreathed Phoenix) and not enough 4-damage burn spells, with the loss of Boros Charm and Warleader’s Helix.
I did not play in the prerelease but the buzz online I saw seems to agree that Abazan (WBG) was the best Clan for limited.
I played in one prerelease as Abzan and went 3-1.
If either player is Abzan, it is an extremely grindy sealed format prone to big groundstalls, since there are relatively few flyers and plenty of removal. It strongly rewards holding your removal and really small incremental advantages. Often the correct play is to just not attack and to build up an outlast creature.
It’s a very mana-hungry format, both because games go long and you will sometimes have multiple morphs and outlast creatures and other activated abilities, and you want to have mana for multiple combat tricks, since you’ll likely end up in a stall and finally have to try to push through. You often want to play morphs facedown even when you have the mana to pay for them, since a facedown morph and mana up will often dissuade an attack better than a face up one.
The one match I lost was basically because I lost the staring contest (and my opponent had a good topdeck). I had been holding unconditional removal for about 15 turns (since the beginning of the game), and I finally got to this game state:
Me: 4/4 lifelinker, 2/1 dork.
Opponent: 4/2 dork, 3/3 dork.
My opponent had emptied his hand a turn ago, so I knew that he only had what he’d drawn. I killed his 4/2 and attacked with my 4/4. He played a 6/6 flash creature to block. I made a game of it after that, but never recovered.
The other two games in that match we split manascrew (although my opponent horribly misbuilt his deck to get there, playing a Polluted Delta and one Island and no Swamps?!). I kept a 2-lander on 6 with two morphs in hand, and didn’t get the 3rd until far too late.
I like slow grindy games and battlecruiser magic (Rise of Eldrazi is one of my favorite formats), so I’m looking forward to it.
I play casual constructed mostly (but standard not any card goes like some casual games are). Of the decks I made I found my aggro Abzan (especially that 4 mana rhino) and an aggro Sultai deck (using those colors but not nay delve cards) were the most successful.
I also made a Johnny kind of deck with the Jeskai Klan leader where she was the only only creature in the deck. That played better than I would have guessed.
Mardu actually did best at the shop I play at, for whatever that’s worth. I suspect a lot of people tried to build specifically anti-Abzan decks, because the early buzz was that they were the strongest in Sealed. It’s not hard to beat it if you have a decent Mardu card pool, but doing so does leave you vulnerable to Jeskai and Temur.
That right there is why I opted against Abzan: the games, especially the mirrors, are too long, and they result in draws, or 1-0 losses. I hate draws with a fiery passion, so I made sure I could either beat Abzan quickly or not at all, and had no draws all day. Most of my friends had 1 or 2.
That’s a tough beat, there.
I loved that 4/2 bear, twice I nabbed one with with Jeering Instigator the turn after my opponent played it.
Now, on to constructed play…
I didn’t have any draws, either. But I play quickly and I’m not shy about telling my opponent they need to play more quickly.
We need more players like you.
I sure was wrong about burn not being a viable archetype, the Jeskai Tempo deck that’s been the early standout is almost a pure burn deck. Looks like I based my burn deck around the wrong wedge, all the Mardu guys are running discard stuff. Rats.
No, Pack Rat rotated out with RTR
I see what you did there.
Pro Tour Khans of Tarkir is this weekend…highly curious to see what decks the pros have crafted, and whether Jeskai Tempo and G/r Devotion will stay as the top dogs.