doctorhydrogen

81 Decks, 1,246 Comments, 346 Reputation

No problem, glad to help. And thanks for the kind words, Phoenix :)

Speaking of lands, I'd say absolutely find a slot for Yavimaya Hollow. Since you're gonna always have access to mana from Omnath it's really easy to use. Asceticism is really solid in most decks, too, and even more so in Omnath where you can save your whole army if need be.

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Posted 19 April 2015 at 18:19 in reply to #546275 on Force of Nature

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I'll keep all suggestions to sub-dollar cards:

IMO Halimar Depths and Flamekin Villiage are almost always worth a slot in a two-color deck.

Galvanoth gives you another excellent way to exploit those instants and sorceries.

Except for some rare situation where you have an opponent at two life and can't hit him/her with a dude Reality Shift is almost always going to be a better removal spell than Shock.

For two more mana than Concentrate, Recurring Insight could easily draw 4x as many cards. It's only one more than Thoughtflare and it'll draw more almost every time without forcing a discard.

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Posted 19 April 2015 at 13:55 as a comment on EDH:Thoughts of Power (Budget)

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Doubling Cube does good work in Omnath, as does Vernal Bloom.

Hall of Gemstone can shut down some decks, and Wave of Vitriol and Primal Order will gut some multi-colored decks with greedy mana bases.

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Posted 19 April 2015 at 03:37 as a comment on Force of Nature

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My deck is, but Aetherize, Aetherspouts, Polymorph, Grav Shift, Bident, Coastal Piracy, Quicksilver fountain and Fugure Sight are all fifty cent cards.

Anyway, good luck!

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Posted 18 April 2015 at 18:13 in reply to #546202 on Can't let you do that. Skyfish

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Future Sight is stupidly good in Talrand. I've played half a dozen cards in a row out of my library with it. That is huge card advantage.

40 lands is probably a bit overkill in a mono-deck.

You seem to be on a budget here, but if you like this deck a lot and want to invest a bit more into it mana doublers like Extraplanar Lens, Gauntlet of Power and Caged Sun (which is like two bucks I think) are HUGE.

They're both kind of dick cards, but Quicksilver Fountain and Back to Basics can shut some people down entirely.

Bident of Thassa and Coastal Piracy can draw stupid amounts of cards here.

Gravitational Shift can get downright scary while simultaneously wrecking goblin, elf, and token-type swarm decks.

You're running more creatures than me, so Polymorph might not be as huge here, but in my deck where I'm just running like four dudes (Jin-gitaxis, Stormtide Leviathan, Arcanis) turning a drake into one of those three while making a drake is a huge play.

Aetherize and Aetherspouts are both great and have won me games multiple times fending off an alpha-strike while making a dude.

Good luck! BTW if you're curious here's my version: http://www.mtgvault.com/doctorhydrogen/decks/talrand-sky-summoner-edh-3/

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Posted 18 April 2015 at 15:07 as a comment on Can't let you do that. Skyfish

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Since you're running no artifacts why not run some artifact hate like Shatterstorm or Creeping Corrosion.

In a deck with a double-striking Atarka, Hunter's Insight is going to draw you mad cards compared to Tormenting Voice.

Ulvenwald Tracker gives you a repeatable fight effect.

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Posted 18 April 2015 at 14:56 as a comment on Budget: Atarka EDH

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Wouldn't Demonic Tutor be better than Fabricate?

One thing to keep an eye out for is draw vs. mana. I was running about this many mana rocks and found too often I was sitting at 10+ mana a turn with nothing to use it on because I was down to one card. Swapping out a few rocks for Mind's Eye, Mystic Remora and Rhystic Study helped a lot.

Caltrops once animated and deathtouched kills all attackers.

Staff of Nin animated and deathtouch is tap to kill target creature, plus it's got draw baked in.

Though it's kind of costly to cast, Dismiss into Dream lets you spend 1 mana to force an opponent to sacrifice an artifact, plus it prevents them from using auras, equipment, and all kinds of other stuff.

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Posted 17 April 2015 at 14:21 as a comment on Sydris

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Exploration and Burgeoning would be great in this deck since you'll be drawing a lot, but they really don't help too much until you have Damia already out. Sure, they're good in your opening hand, but you drop all your land, and then sit there. The cards I listed let you get more land into play without relying on drawing it. They get you to the point where you can play Damia, then Exploration and Burgeoning let you play all the lands you draw with her.

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Posted 15 April 2015 at 13:06 in reply to #545688 on Draw step

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I'd replace some creatures with ramp, especially in a deck with such a high curve. Nature's Lore, Rampant Growth, Skyshroud Claim, Explosive Vegetation, Cultivate, and Kodama's Reach are good options. Myself? I'd run them all.

If you ever get sick of just running goodstuff (nothing wrong with goodstuff, mind you) I'd say give a long look to running deathtouch tribal. It's super fun to play and nobody knows how to deal with it.

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Posted 14 April 2015 at 19:29 as a comment on Draw step

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Some small dudes to consider:

Cloud of Faeries- 1/1 flier for essentially zero mana

Dryad Sophisticate- Almost never doesn't have landwalk

Kira, Great Glass-Spinner- Yeah, it's 3 mana for a 2/2 flier, but the protection is amazing

Looter il-Kor- Gonna almost always be unblockable, and it's a rogue for Notorious Throng

Trygon Predator- The removal attached makes it worth the three mana

Just some general stuff:

Druid's Repository and Nature's Will generate a stupid, stupid amount of mana in Edric decks.

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Posted 13 April 2015 at 16:32 as a comment on Edric's Spies

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You're running Unravel already, but I'd swap Artisan's Sorrow for Deglamer. I've never, ever wished my Naturalize could scry, but there's been a hell of a lot of times I've wished it could deal with that Theros god or Darksteel whatever.

Both Hall of Gemstone and Vernal Bloom are great in mono-green, though Hall is kind of a dick card.

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Posted 13 April 2015 at 03:56 as a comment on Jacque's Budget Big Green EDH

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I play a lot of Talrand (http://www.mtgvault.com/doctorhydrogen/decks/talrand-sky-summoner-edh-3/) so here's a few observations

Future Sight is amazingly good in this deck. It can "draw" you half a dozen cards in a single turn (Ponder into a Portent into a Mystical Tutor into a whatever). Seriously, it wins games.

Proteus Staff magically turns one of your 2/2 drakes into one of the OP creatures in your deck. Polymorph does the same, and it makes a drake at the same time, plus both can be used to get rid of an annoying opponent's creature if you're desperate.

Back to Basics and Quicksilver Fountain can flat out shut down some decks. Both can be considered kinda dick cards though, so running them would be pretty meta-dependent.

Gauntlet of Power and Caged Sun are both here, and both are amazing, but Extraplanar Lens is pretty great, too.

If you just want a two-drop mana rock then Fellwar Stone is better than Fractured Powerstone. Odds are someone else is playing blue, or playing a City of Brass or Vivid land or whatever that will let you make blue. Absolutely worst case it's just as good as Fractured Powerstone, but it has a bit more upside.

Dissipate and Dissolve are strictly better than Cancel.

Isochron Scepter is amazing here, as the copied spell also makes a token. I intentionally try not to imprint counterspells or Boomerang or anything annoying so my friends don't punch me in the face, but even just copying a Brainstorm with it is insane.

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Posted 11 April 2015 at 02:12 as a comment on talrand

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Wasn't thinking of infinite combos. Makes sense.

Training Grounds will do what Heartstone does, but it only does it for you, reduces the cost by 2 colorless, and only costs 1 to cast.

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Posted 11 April 2015 at 00:19 in reply to #545298 on Arcanis' Academy [EDH]

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At the end of it all I think Azami probably offers more draw than Arcanis in a wizard deck. She's also psychologically less of a OMG MUST KILL, and she generally hurts you less when someone steals her. That said:

You've got Dismiss entered twice.

Gilded Lotus and Thran Dynamo are good, but all things considered I'd much rather run Caged Sun, Extraplanar Lens and Gauntlet of Might.

99.9% of the time Faerie Trickery is going to be a Dissipate. I'd run it over Cancel.

Cyclonic Rift is so good, but so are it's little brothers Wash Out and Inundate.

Myriad Landscape is great ramp in mono, as is Wayfarer's Bauble.

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Posted 10 April 2015 at 21:40 as a comment on Arcanis' Academy [EDH]

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The thing is, this deck really doesn't have that much ramp. There's three mana doublers, a few rocks, one land tutor, and Coffers and ways to copy it. It has less ramp at a much higher curve than my fairly casual mono-black vampires deck, and that deck gets outraced fairly regularly in a meta that really isn't that cutthroat.

I mean, sure you're going to have games where you T1 Sol Ring, Mind Stone, T2 Thran Dynamo, T3 Kozilek or whatever, but how often does that happen? Unless you're playing with people who don't remove anything (which you may be since you're packing no targeted removal yourself) then I don't see how you're going to outplay anything slightly more tuned than a precon.

That said, every meta is different, and maybe in yours this particular setup is what works. I run almost no non-exile removal in my decks because of the sheer number of indestructible creatures I see in games, and that probably looks nuts to anyone in a meta where that isn't a problem, so to each his own.

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Posted 10 April 2015 at 13:33 in reply to #544051 on Sheoldred, Graveyard Mistress

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Vandalblast overloaded is probably going to be a cheaper artifact wipe than targeting Shattering Spree multiple times, plus Vandalblast will hit stuff that's untargetable.

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Posted 09 April 2015 at 21:22 as a comment on Gruul Smash EDH

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There's two issues with enchantments: 1. without a commander with some kind of hexproof ability they're almost always going to be down in resources when you get 2-for-1'ed on a removal spell (or worse) unless you invest in running quite a few auras that make your guy hexproof or untargetable, and those auras don't actually buff him/her beyond that, and 2. if you're running white/blue enchantments you're much, much better off just running Bruna or Hanna, and I can tell you from experience that I at least found Bruna to be boring as hell.

I'd guess equipment might be the best path here, maybe with a soldier tribal subtheme?

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Posted 09 April 2015 at 12:38 in reply to #545044 on Daxos of Meletis EDH (help?)

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IMO pick artifacts or enchantments; run one, and run hate for the other.

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Posted 09 April 2015 at 05:17 as a comment on Daxos of Meletis EDH (help?)

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It would be great if you cut cut and paste this verbatim into some other people's deck in a naked attempt to get eyeballs onto your own link.

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Posted 07 April 2015 at 00:18 in reply to #544683 on Sheoldred's Sweet Whispers

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I've played Talrand a ton. Observations in general:

Mana doublers are the bomb. You're running Caged Sun, but I'd find room for Extraplanar Lens and Gauntlet of Power.

Though it's kind of a dick card, Quicksilver Fountain can win you games if dropped early.

Bident of Thassa and Coastal Piracy can draw stupid amounts of cards, repeatedly. Replacing stuff like Ideas Unbound with those made filling my hand a lot easier.

Polymorph is another way to turn a drake into Stormtide or Tidespout, and it can function as emergency creature removal if someone drops something you need to get rid of that you couldn't counter. Switcheroo is nice too.

Faerie Trickery makes a great counterspell.

I need to add a Foil to my deck, I'm stealing that one. Good call on Torpor Orb too, since none of your dudes have ETB effects. I'll try to find room for one.

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Posted 05 April 2015 at 16:58 as a comment on "Talrand's Loaded Grip" EDH

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