MTG

CovertGoBlue talks about his frustrations with the 3-year Standard rotation, and how difficult it has been lately to create Standard content.

Talks about his decaying Twitch audience and plans to move more content in YouTube. He mentions his distress in playing Arena in general, and how he doesn't necessarily want to play a different game mode in Arena.

He's will place more emphasis on Commander content. Optionally will make content elsewhere, something different or new that he is more interested in.

Murders at Karlov Manor

Okay here is the Dwarf review Murders at Karlov Manor. Tis a wee bit sad no Dwarves hopped across the omen paths for this set, but I think there are few cards worth talking about that can help our heroes of the hallowed halls. When looking at the cards, I will mostly be referencing Explorer/Pioneer, Historic and Commander decks that utilize Dwarf tribal. The decks I typically use are:

1. [[Depala, Pilot Exemplar]] RW deck - The original Dwarf Lord that actually cares about dwarves. She also cares about vehicles and with Magda on her team she can pack quite a punch.
2. [[Magda Brazen Outlaw]] R deck – This deck likes to turn dwarves sideway for treasure, then sacking that treasure for a game changing dragon or artifact.
3. Boros Equipment/Auras,- Dwarves actually have quite a few cards that work with this strategy, [[Bruenor Battlehammer]], [[Koll the Forge Master]], and [[Reyav, Master Smith]].
4. [[Torbran Thane of Red Fell]] R Deck – Basically put the best burn spells and damage causing spells you can and the best dwarves (and maybe a few Dragons) you can get. Extra combat steps and double strike are nice too.
5. [[Lady of Otaria]] RG Deck – Recently introduced. Basically, somehow sacrifice lands and get dwarves into your hand. I have a deck, but it is still a work in progress. Anyone else build a deck with her yet?

White: [[Wrench]] A one mana equipment that gives a tap outlet, I like it. You can tap a nasty blocker for a Bruenor deck or if you have Magada on the board tap a dwarf for some treasure.

[[Call a Surprise Witness]] Most dwarves are three mana or less, so getting them back from the graveyard and with flying it pretty nice. Flying dwarves are pretty awesome, especially with Magda on the board as more evasion equals more turning sideways for treasure.

Red [[Expedited Inheritance]]

This is a nice card draw for a Torbran deck. Kill some creatures and then exile some cards to play.

[[Knife]] Not a bad one mana weapon for Bruenor. First strike and the utility of sacking it for a card is nice.

[[Torch the Witness]] Another card for the Torbran deck, now all of that extra damage that Torbran creates does not go to waste, you get to investigate.

[[Concealed Weapon]] Cool, this weapon is great for the Boros dwarf equipment decks. One issue with these decks is sometimes you have bunch of equipment but no creatures, this gives a serviceable body with ward 2 no less! And if you do want to turn it into an equipment it attaches for free.

[[Suspicious Detonation]] Okay, I am really liking this card for a Magda deck. Hopefully with her out you have at least one treasure to sacrifice and then you have an un-counterable 4 damage spell. Not bad.

[[Demand Answers]] Again with Magda out it is super easy to sacrifice an artifact, so getting two cards for two mana seems like a good idea.

[[Mob Verdict]] Okay here is a Commander card that would be fun with Torbran, if you aren’t picked you’re probably wiping someone's board and if you are picked free cards. I like it!

[[Prisoner’s Dilemma]] Wow, just wow, another great Commander card for our favorite grudging Dwarf. If I ever get to play this with Torbran it would be so much fun, and with flashback too! I really like this.

Multi-colored

[[Warleader’s Call]] Not bad for a dwarf deck, giving them a boost is nice and I tend to cast a lot of them so it might add up to a lot of damage.

[[Break Out]] Okay I mention this card because I think it might work well in deck running the [[Doors of Durin]] as this does a similar thing. Also, help move potentially non-creature cards out of the way to Doors of During can cook.

[[Take the Bait]] I think I like this card. I might try it in the Boros dwarf equipment decks, might be nice to get rid of potential blockers when I really want to attack with my one big supped up dwarf on the following turn.

[[Aegis of Legion]] This card looks fun for a Boros dwarf equipment deck. Get your equipped dwarfs bigger and a shield counter. Keeping your dwarves alive is always a challenge and anything to help with that is welcomed!

Okay that’s it for now. I for one am holding out for a Dwarven Cowboy or something in Thunder Junction. 😊.

So I've always wanted an Enchantress deck, but never had the cash when I was playing legacy. But now we're suddenly playing Commander and I think it might still be fun to give Enchantress a go...

I was thinking to go with Sythis, Harvest Hand as the commander. What have you played that's fun?

Also contains quite a few previews of cards in Clue Edition that will hopefully be showing up in !spoilers@mtgzone.com

It’s really hard to pass up artifact hate and creature +PW hate, but it’ll be a minute before I can get copies of it.

The format is timeless on arena btw.

The writer of the Murders at Karlov Manor, Seanan McGuire has made blog posts with her thoughts on each of the chapters. Neat if you want some more insight on the story

Ghosts of Our Pasts

Monsters We Became

Shadows of Regret

Justice Before Mercy

Chains of Expectation

Explosions of Genius

Rot Before Recovery

Gods of Chaos

Beauty in Destruction

Roots of Decay

Stolen from Reddit but was easier than trying to copy the table in the announcement article

Source: https://magic.wizards.com/en/news/announcements/whats-new-on-the-list-for-murders-at-karlov-manor

It seems like all of the conversation about the meta has fragmented into a bunch of discords and paywalled data aggregation. Where does an aspiring serious player go to fill in the 2-3 years of missed meta knowledge?

In my school years I used to play a casual format with my friends we called „King and Flanks“ (german „König und Flanken“). Here is what I remember rule-wise:

You have two teams of three players each, with one king per team and two flanks (left and right). The each flank can only attack their opposing flank and once that player was dead the enemy king. The king can “send” their creatures through their flanks and can attack with the same abilities as either flank. The players have separate life totals, but share a turn (i.e. have to declare attackers at the same time).

What I am unsure about is how targeting spells and abilities work. Limiting the restrictions to attacking creatures seems unbalanced to me.

The format was a lot of fun, since slow decks can really shine as kings. We never build decks specifically for this format, this might have broken it.

Has anyone ever heard of such a format? What do you think the targeting limitations should be? Can someone point me to a source of this? I could not find anything on the internet.

Finally time for a Reserved List episode