Collectible Card Game Headquarters

http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/A ... arcana/242

well well. I think they are starting to print a little too many things.
Not to mention it will be painful to scan

Busy year.

Conflux done!
Duel Decks: Divine vs Demonic done!
Alara Reborn done!
Magic 2010 done!
From the Vault: Exiled Release Date: August 28th, 2009
Planechase Release Date: September 4th, 2009
Zendikar Prerelease Events: September 26-27, 2009
Duel Decks: Garruk vs. Liliana Release Date: October 30, 2009
Premium Deck Series: Slivers Release date: November 20, 2009
...

More painful if you want to buy them $35????Ouch!

Here's my announcement of the same with a bit more analysis.

In what must be the most exciting announcement of late, Wizards have announced a new limited run release.

To add onto the already popular Duel Decks and From The Vaults series, Wizards has introduced a very pricey Premium Deck Series. The first of this series is everyones' favourite/infamous creature type and a very distinctive deck archetype - SLIVERS.

http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/arcana/242



Special bits to note about this series... All the cards are foil. Repeat... ALL! It only contains one deck in a FOIL deck box?! Talk about odd since it probably won't be big enough to fit the cards sleeved and you'd want to protect these. This specific deck includes cards that have never been released as foil cards before considering the sets they originally came from where pre-foil. All the cards as well as the spindown counter will bear the Sliver symbol below. The deck has 5 rare cards and 1 mythic rare. Hmmm... This will obviously be one of the Legendary Slivers. Any bets on whether it will be Stronghold's Sliver Queen, Scourge's Sliver Overlord or Future Sight's Sliver Legion? Each card will be black bordered and tournament legal (legal for use in any tournaments where the original printings are still legal).



Release date: November 20, 2009
Manufacturer's Suggested Retail Price: $34.99

What I want to know is what would you play this deck against? A mirror match?! hehe...

Question! When did they start adding the "premium" cards to packs? Because the way that's worded about "none of these cards have ever been foil" if it was before Onslaught, that would mean ONLY Tempest and family slivers would be in the deck, but if it was after that, it would mean both those two blocks. It would also mean that Sliver Legion is out (though that's obviously the best sliver lord) he's been printed in foil SOMEWHERE! Or at least the odds suggest someone is super lucky and has a foil one.

if i read it correctly, it didn't say that ALL the slivers were being printed in foil for the first time... just that SOME of them were getting the treatment for the first time. i think we can safely assume that there will be slivers from pretty much all eras of sliverdom.

including several that have never been released in foil before!

FPM is right, some of the slivers have been released as foils before. But if you still want to know when foils were first added to booster packs, it was Urza's Legacy.

So we finally have the deck list for the Slivers deck and it looks good-ish...
http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/arcana/314

Some of the choices were a bit dodgy but I can see why they went with slivers with activated costs rather than their static ability brothers and sisters. They didn't want it to be too overpowered especially in mirror matches. Also, some slivers have duplicate abilities and they chose the more obvious on-colour one or the less overpowered one.

• Activated cost +1/+0 Barbed Sliver instead of static ability Blade Sliver
• Activated cost +0/+1 Armored Sliver instead of static ability Plated Sliver
• Activated cost regenerator Clot Sliver instead of tap regenerate Crypt Sliver or expensive tap regenerate Poultice Sliver
• Original +1/+1 pumper Muscle Sliver (and we get 2!) instead of planeshifted Sinew Sliver
• Quick "easily playable in a 5 colour deck" colourless artifact Metallic Sliver (and we get 2!) instead of big colourless artifact Venser's Sliver
• Cheap colour relevant flying Winged Sliver instead of expensive odd extra ability unplayable Pulmonic Sliver
• Cheap colour relevant hasty Heart Sliver instead of expensive slightly off colour Reflex Sliver or Fires of Yavimaya-esque Firewake Sliver
• Expensive sacrifice life gain Victual Sliver instead of typical cheap green-black sacrifice life gain Darkheart Sliver.

Amazing ones that were included irrespective of, or especially because of, power:

• Crystalline Sliver - Granting all slivers shroud.
• Homing Sliver - Future Sight future frame slivercycling tutor is perfect for fetching that important sliver.
• Virulent Sliver - Future Sight future frame poisonous sliver because killing with poison is amazing. They even gave us two of these to be sure we kill using poison.
• Frenzy Sliver - Future Sight future frame frenzy (unblocked get +1/0) sliver makes sure that the defending player runs out of options fast.
• Necrotic Sliver - Vindicate on a stick sliver.
• Brood Sliver - Make more slivers when any sliver deals combat damage. Hopefully the box comes with a 1/1 colourless Sliver creature token and I would expect it to be foil too!

Other slivers in the deck:

• Gemhide Sliver - 2 mana slivers to help accelerate a five colour deck is always good. Remember, all slivers get this ability.
• Acidic Sliver - sacrifice for 2 damage to creature or player.
• Hibernation Sliver - 2 life and bounce
• Fury Sliver - Since no first strike slivers were included, including the only double strike sliver was a given even though he's expensive.
• Fungus Sliver - For some good fungus/hydra-like regrowth effect.
• Quick Sliver - Flash for all slivers.
• Essence Sliver - Gain life from damage. (not identical to lifelink).
• Other mediocre pump slivers - +2/+2 pumper Might Sliver when they could have just given us another Muscle Sliver; Spectral Sliver the activated colourless shadelike pumper; and Spined Sliver rampage-ish pump effect.

Slivers that didn't make the cut (apart from ones I've already mentioned above)

• Sliver Legion - I assume this didn't make the cut since they wanted to reprint Sliver Overlord as the mythic rare in this deck. First time in the new frame.
• Sliver Queen - As much as this would have been amazing, she's on the Reserved List and therefore will not be reprinted (anytime soon unless WotC changes their policy).
• Neither trample sliver - On colour green Horned Sliver and expensive off colour Battering Sliver.
• Neither first strike sliver - On colour white Talon Sliver and expensive off colour Spitting Sliver.
• Synchronous Sliver - A vigilant sliver could create a board locking situation even if it is expensive to bring out.
• Bonesplitter Sliver +2/+0 and Watcher Sliver +0/+2 - since they didn't keep the weaker counterparts (see above) these were obviously also cut from the list.
• Other regular keyword ability slivers - provoke Hunter Sliver; flanking Sidewinder Sliver; spider reach Spinneret Sliver; and shadow Shadow Sliver
• Silly ability slivers - Defender Dormant Sliver with ETB draw capability; Ghostflame Sliver with colourless ability; Frenetic Sliver with coin tossing exile&return/sacrifice ability; and upkeep controller damaging Plague Sliver.
• Tap ability slivers - Name and discard Dementia Sliver; creature type related power pumping Magma Sliver; psionic blast/entity Psionic Sliver; attacker/blocker pinger Quilled Sliver; milling Screeching Sliver; tapper Telekinetic Sliver
• The remaining Future Sight future frame cards - fateseal Mesmeric Sliver and absorb Lymph Sliver
• Sacrifice ability slivers - dark ritual-esque Basal Sliver; 1 damage to creature or player OR prevent 1 damage to Sliver or player Cautery Sliver; each player discarder Mindlash Sliver; single player discarder Mindwhip Sliver; creature type changing Mistform Sliver; and draw card Mnemonic Sliver
• Other slivers - ETB naturalize Harmonic Sliver; target me to draw Opaline Sliver; uncounterable Root Sliver; off colour swamp matters regenerating red Sedge Sliver; the almost game ending (in non-mirror matches) slivers can't be blocked by slivers Shifting Sliver; Thieving Magpie-esque card draw from combat damage Synapse Sliver; deathtouch-like Toxin Sliver; two-headed dragon wannabe Two-Headed Sliver; baby vampire Vampiric Sliver; colour protective Ward Sliver

Almost forgot about the additional cards in the deck!

The decks got a bunch of basic lands but we have no idea on the artwork used (I doubt that they will be full art). We get 5 x Forest, 3 x Mountain, 2 Plains, 2 x Swamp and 2 x Island.

To further support this 5 colour deck they've given us: 2 Vivid Groves, 2 Vivid Creeks, 2 Terramorphic Expanse, 2 Rupture Spires, 2 Ancient Ziggurats and 1 Rootbound Crag.

The remaining cards are interesting choices. Aphetto Dredging, Coat of Arms and Distant Melody all play on the fact that all your creatures share a type. Aphetto Dredging resurrects your creatures by returning them from the graveyard to your hand. Coat of Arms recreates the Sliver Legion effect the deck needs. Distant Melody just refills your hand. Heartstone helps explain their choice of mana heavy activated slivers by making the activations cheaper. Wild Pair is the oddest choice for this deck but it does its work by getting more slivers onto the battlefield quickly. There's also an Amoeboid Changeling in the deck and I've no clue why it would be there except for mirror matches.

Do remember that ALL of these cards are foil including the Rootbound Crag and all the other lands (basic or otherwise). Definitely a worthwhile buy...

ready for release

woot

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i dunno what huggy's waiting for. guess he's busy.

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