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Recently I asked you to pick sets for my 'low-power' quest (viewtopic.php?f=26&t=19230). You gave me Antiquities, Homelands, Mercadian Masques, and Prophecy.

Since votes seem to be still dropping in, I decided to continue my Quest log posts under this new topic rather than keep bumping up the voting topic (my Quest has already started, I don't need more votes).

Continuing directly from the last post in the old thread, viewtopic.php?f=26&t=19230

Duel 4: Enchantress
Game 1: Won (easily with Story Circle, Cho-Manno's Blessing).
Game 2: The Devout Witness proves his usefulness. Trashed a Living Artifact and Web. Got Avatar of Will out with , bribed a Cockatrice. Easy victory.
2-0, record 4-0.

New cards of note: Brainstorm, Nightwind Glider.

Duel 5: Sorceress
Game 1: Terrible start, things get better with Story Circle out. Won despite numerous play mistakes on my part.
Game 2: Again sub-optimal play from me. Had to hard cast Avatar of Will for the first time.
2-0, record 5-0.
Side note: I'm starting to love Story Circle and Devout Witness. I might have to reconsider my opinion of Spellshapers.

New cards of note: Counterspell (yay!).
Enough credits for 19 life. Raised.

Duel 6: Sorcerer
Game 1: Easy win, Serrated-Arrowed several 1 toughness weenies that were just about to receive Giant Strength; I call that good card economy.
Game 2: Ghastly opening hand, mulligan down some. To avoid straight loss to a Giant Strengthed Brass Man cast on turn 1, have to trade 2 Gliders plus a Serrated token to it. Down to 4 life. Things get worse. Manabarbs, I don't have enough Islands to counter it in any fashion (just 1 Island in play, none in my hand). Then the Sorcerer starts playing stupidly and hurts himself with repeated Manabarbs. I have a Diving Griffin that does the honors.
2-0, record 6-0.

New cards of note: Su-Chi, a solid beater for without mana burn. From the store: Larceny, Bog Glider, Agent of Shauku. In case I start building that Black deck.

Duel 7: Ape Lord
Game 1: The Ape Lord drops two Dragon Engines, my Devout Witness takes down both. The I bribe a Shivan Dragon, he casts a Shivan of his own. I win because of flier advantage, including a pro-Red (Cho-Manno's Blessing) Tetravus.
Game 2: I play the wrong lands for the first two turns. The Ape Lord leads with a Dragon Engine again. He gets mana screwed and I win.
2-0, record 7-0.

New cards of note: Gate to Phyrexia, Power Artifact, more Urza lands. Yes, I picked an Antiquities booster, so what..?

Duel 8: Conjurer
Game 1: Super boring game. I mow her down with Su-Chi, the Conjurer snipes at me with her Tims. I finish her off with Su-Chi and the Avatar of Will.
Game 2: I ultimately lose this one to her serious sniping advantage (2 Pirate Ships, 2 Tims, 2 Rods of Ruin). But yes, I also made a couple of stupid mistakes. My first game loss in this Quest.
Game 3: I get early Gliders out while she gets mana screwed (2 Islands). Not looking a gift horse in the mouth. I win without the Conjurer getting a single hit in.
2-1, record 8-0.

New cards of note: Intimidation and Snuff Out, plus a second Bog Glider from the store. More building blocks for a possible future Black deck. Also some random Rebels and an Indentured Djinn - a gamble at best, the disadvantage is crazy against a human opponent, but you just could get away with it against the AI. Still somewhat counterproductive if I'm seeking to later cast the Avatar of Will for the alternate cost.

Current record 12-1.

My only loss so far was my second match against the Elvish Mage.
Game 1: The Indentured Djinn bites back, big time. I lose to a massive creature horde.
Game 2: I win. Flier advantage.
Game 3: Can't keep up with the pace he's putting out creatures. I lose.

Other highlights:
My second match against the Sea Dragon, game 2.
I get out an early Story Circle. I bribe a Segovian Leviathan. Then this happens: I'm attacking with the bribed Segovian Leviathan and a Nightwind Glider. The Sea Dragon casts Jump on its own Segovian Leviathan and on its Sea Serpent. In response, I 'flash' Cho-Manno's Blessing on the Glider and they still cannot block it. ...I win.


Notable new cards: a second Gush, a second Story Circle, 2 Strip Mines, 2 more Devout Witnesses.
From the store: Ihsan's Shade (solid against White decks), some non-useless Mercenaries, 2 Cackling Witches, a second Larceny (synergy with my 2 Tetravi, perhaps?). More potential building blocks for the Black or Black/White deck-to-be.

Now 24-2.

My second loss was to an Elven Druid (medium). I was experimenting with the BW deck I had just created. Turns out that the Silent Assassin was much less useful than I had thought. To be blunt, she was rubbish. Way, way too situational - and the situation never came. Also, a second Larceny is useless. I need more plain muscle or playable removal instead of those two. Swapped them out for a Charmed Griffin and an Afterlife (good against creatres that are resistant to Black removal). Adjusted my land balance accordingly.

As for the Elvish Mage (my first match loss), I eventually got my payback. My last Easy game was a rematch against him, and this time it was a straight 2-0 win for me.

Interesting new cards - more copies of what I have already plus a Dust Bowl. A reusable wasteland (kind of), so it ought to be useful against the Hard and Very Hard opponents who pack lots of nonbasic lands in their decks.

Currently trying to decide between the WU and the WB builds. I don't have enough playable cards of any one color for a solid monochrome build, hence the 2-color builds. I feel that the BW deck is inherently stronger but I kind of miss the Counterspells and the Bribery. But if I get my mitts on a Charisma, I see a UB build in my horizon... (a Charismatic Thrashing Wumpus, anyone?)

I think that the key problem of my decks is that they lack focus. They have some aggro elements without going far enough; some Rebels without a coherent Rebels deck structure. They also have control elements, including protection (Story Circle), Counterspells (the UW build) Creature removal (the WB build), artifact&enchantment control (Devout Witness), even land destruction (a Dust Bowl and some Strip Mines) but again are not geared towards any specific control deck game plan. I think I eventually need to go one route or the other or the Hard/Very Hard opponents will make short work of my deck. The problem is obvious when I'm playing fast, aggressive opponents who drop lots of threats in the early game (i.e., just about every Green deck) - that's how my two match losses happened. I cannot match their speed with my aggro elements, and my control elements aren't heavy enough to establish board control later on either. Agains control decks, I'm doing much better, though: my aggro creatures deal some early damage to put the opponent on the clock, and my control elements are usually enough to disrupt their later attempts at comeback.

Some time later, a Charisma shows up in the spell store! They want 724 credits for it, and I have, after selling off Ambush Parties and other HML rubbish I was awarded with this time, just about enough, 740. Needless to say, I snatch it immediately. Total must-have.

Now let's see about that UB build...

Some general thoughts / observations:

1) I really need to rethink my opinion on spellshapers. Apparently not all of them are rubbish, only the Blue ones are rubbish. The more I play with the White and Black spellshapers, the more I like them.

2) Being limited to sets and cards I might not normally choose is a most refreshing experience. It forces me to think in new ways and explore strategies I might never try otherwise. On top of that, it is also a very fun experience! Really have to try this again (once I'm 'done' with this Quest), with some other offbeat combination of sets.

3) That said, I think this particular Quest game may have been 'spoiled' by the MMQ set. There are just too many useful cards available in that set, both staples like Counterspell and Disenchant as well as some not-so-low-power cards and strategies. In short, I think this game would have been a lot more challenging if I hadn't had Access to that particular set. It just wasn't as low-power or limited as the trest. Next time, I will have to choose 'weaker' sets only.

RumbleBBU wrote:Some general thoughts / observations:

1) I really need to rethink my opinion on spellshapers. Apparently not all of them are rubbish, only the Blue ones are rubbish. The more I play with the White and Black spellshapers, the more I like them.

What? Waterfront Bouncer is amazing.

friarsol wrote:

RumbleBBU wrote:Some general thoughts / observations:

1) I really need to rethink my opinion on spellshapers. Apparently not all of them are rubbish, only the Blue ones are rubbish. The more I play with the White and Black spellshapers, the more I like them.

What? Waterfront Bouncer is amazing.

You know, way back when, I really tried to make them work...the Blue ones, in particular...and always failed miserably. That's why I ended up writing off spellshapers altogether.

But let's just chalk it up to my bad playing.

RumbleBBU wrote:But let's just chalk it up to my bad playing.

Some of them are bad, but that one is so cheap for such a powerful effect. You do have to know how to use them efficiently. I think of all of the original spellshapers, Dawnstrider was my favorite, since it was my "secret tech" in a mono-green land destruction deck I used back in the day starring Masticore, Plow Under, and Yavimaya Elder. I think I still have that one somewhere in my deck box.

Now 45-4.

My third loss was a 1-2 match to an Archangel. My Story Circles did little when she kept spewing out colorless Wasp tokens, and she totally wrecked my Devout Witnesses (StP, Wrath and so on) and I had no more answers to her artifact onslaught.

The fourth loss was to Random, who is an Encyclopedia World opponent playing a 5-color control deck. Again, 1-2. I was testing my newish UB Charisma deck. In the first game, he simply undid everything I was trying to accomplish. He had just about every card a strong Encyclopedia-era control deck needs and dual lands to power them. The second game, things went my way. Game three, I had one of the most terrible draws ever in a Forge game. My opening hand had 2 lands and very expensive spells. Didn't draw more land, I was discarding spells I couldn't cast. And what I could cast was either countered or stolen from me. Then I started drawing nothing but land. Land, land, land, land...with no spells to cast. My stolen creatures beat me to death. A very frustrating game.

Some observations though...

Most notably, I don't think my UB Charisma deck is ready for showtime yet. Not against Hard/Very Hard opponents at least. I have only one copy of Charisma and Thrashing Wumpus. Even with the blue library manipulation available in this format (like Brainstorm), I don't think I've ever pulled that combo off yet. No wait, I did...once, but at that point, I already had full board control and my opponent was at 2 life, so I just blasted him dead with the Wumpus.

Also, Narjhan really is useless. Even in a Charisma deck. I desperately need more Thrashing Wumpuses (and Charismas).