Tin Elves - Tin Elves. My last artifact combo deck for Magic the Gathering. Felt super solid in the last game. The deck goes hard on artifact combos, but uses a number of elements that also work super well for an aggro strategy. If my combo pieces get shot down, I just attack with a horde of Thopters. And Emry as Commander helps me get around the Commander tax because her Affinity-to-Artifacts ability is worth its weight in gold in this deck - and since she's also a combo piece, the deck has very good chances of coming back from behind. I'll probably still stabilize the list a bit, but the composition seems to be a real hit. Probably going to Bologna with it.
Archive 2019
Wingspan is my new addition from Essen this year (not the only one, but the one I've played so far) and I'm very happy to have bought the game. A tableau builder with cards, where the cards improve the action possibilities - that's already perfect for me. Variable setup, secret objectives and high combo potential in the cards make it even better. And the first games with 2 and 5 players were super exciting. The game offers a nice escalation curve in the game - the rounds have fewer and fewer actions, but the actions themselves get better and better. And when you hit a productive combo, it just feels good. Add to that good quality materials and appealing graphics, this is a slam-dunk for me.
Golos is on a pilgrimage to find the most efficient combos to run in his deck - and I am helping him to achieve his goal. My last decklist, which I am working on. It's going pretty hard towards cEDH. The first games already felt really good, even though a bit of the explosive combo feeling was missing. But that might not be bad in my meta either, we play longer games. Therefore, the list is more focused on answers and less on T2 combo-win. But from what the list does, it fully goes in my preferred direction - not suicide combo, but first see what's possible, then strike when no one can answer enough.
Marvel Champions - Fantasy Flight Games Wow, this is unexpected. It looks very much like another offshoot of the LOTR system, albeit somewhat streamlined at first glance. But if it still achieves the gameplay depth of LOTR, that would be great. I do have a well-running Magic game round now, but for in-between, I always found LOTR quite exciting, as many game decisions (specifically the scenario-specific building of a deck) are very close to Magic.
Wow, Pauper Comes to Paper - with unified legality. Unfortunately, two of my favorite commons are banned: Hymn to Tourach and High Tide. Too bad. But still nice to finally have a unified legality for cards.
The London Mulligan will be the official mulligan in Magic starting with Core Set 2020. Great. We tried it in Commander and it was completely fine. And it was also good in Pauper. Of course, there are certainly a few decks that benefit excessively, but that can be regulated otherwise. The new mulligan simply helps to avoid "non-games" due to multiple bad starting hands. There's nothing more annoying than losing a game in the mulligan because every hand was without lands or only lands.
A Force to be Reckoned With - the new card "Force of Vigor" has just hit two of my decks hard. Jhoira as an artifact storm deck and Paradox Arcum as an artifact combo are both quite dependent on their artifacts and enchantments, such a card can just turn them off. Instant speed. For free. Ouch. If other lists go stronger on mana dorks instead of mana rocks, they have enough green cards to get FoV active. And then I'm out. Jhoira might still be able to hold on, but Storm usually has several vectors, but since artifacts only become instant-speed with Shimmer Myr (and it remains vulnerable as an artifact), Arcum is really hard hit.
May 20, 2019 Banned and Restricted Announcement - Wizards of the Coast just neutralized two of my decks for me - Izzet Blitz needs the free spells to pump its creatures or activate direct damage and Skred Delver needed them to fill the hand in the midgame. Ouch. Okay, lately I've mostly played Tron (or GB Tortex if I was in the mood for wild board states), but still, Skred Delver was always my favorite deck because of its explosive comebacks.
Metaowl is gone
Alright folks, Metaowl has gone all digital today: there was this ancient WP installation running in the background, with various customizations. It was simply beyond saving, getting it to fly with newer PHP versions just takes too much time. I also don't think anyone will notice that the owl is no longer there. It was just a piece of internet history.
I like the new MTG Mulligan variant that is to be tested in London. Definitely, it must be seen whether this does not favor combos too much, but the current mana system and the structure of the current Mulligan simply lead to non-games too often, especially in my favorite format EDH. And it just feels stupid when you have to go down to 4 and still have a crappy hand, or then just scoop - and the others can discard their good starting hands because they would otherwise have a game with N-1 players, where one watches. Of course, in multiplayer, you can directly offer the other a further 7-card Mulligan, but the new variant would not make this necessary - I can always choose the best N cards from 7, so a 4-card Mulligan is bearable.