Block Review
Posted: 08 Apr 2015, 14:28
I stopped playing magic when Ice Age came out. Reasons include the fact that Ice Age was designed as a standalone, the snow mechanism, dissatisfaction with 4th Edition, and the fact that my favorite deck (BR Fast No Creatures) had fallen out of my pocket and was now gone. I sold all my cards (including probably 20+ dual lands, a few Power Nine, Library of Alexandria, etc.) and called it quits for the next 20 years.
I've recently started playing again thanks to Manalink, and as a thank you, I thought I'd review every block. As I've not lived with the past 20 years of magic, this may be an interesting vantage point.
Here are my deck-building rules, which were used to review the blocks:
1) total singleton: each card may only occur in one deck
1B) Basic lands are of course excepted. Certain lands may instead be restricted to 4 per deck, depending on the card (e.g. painlands, fetchlands, etc.)
2) Hosing cards are generally excluded, as these would not be effective against most decks
3) The maximum number of decks must be created
4) Flavor Matters (e.g. for Theros each god gets a deck, and cards relating to that god must be in that deck)
4B) I will make mistakes here; don't sweat it
5) Early Sets had me stumped for a while, but after some trial and error, I decided to divvy this into two blocks:
a. Unlimited, Arabian Nights & Antiquities
b. Legends, The Dark, Fallen Empire (plus basic and dual lands)
Legends was originally intended to be a stand-alone set, and I treated it as such. Matching the expansions like this keeps the Large-Small-Small expansion format. It also works on a different level, in that Legends, The Dark and Fallen Empire are, from a design perspective, fucking terrible, in a way that Arabian Nights and Antiquities aren't, but more of that when we get to the review.
As an aside, from a flavor perspective it would make more sense for Unlimited-Arabian Nights-Legends (which create/describe the world) and Antiquities-The Dark-Fallen Empire (The Brothers War and the descent toward the Ice Age). In that case, the third block should be Ice Age/Homelands/Coldsnap/Alliances. While the Unlimited block could be made to work, the Brothers War would be 303 mostly useless cards.
5B) Homelands got 1 standalone deck. To make it work, it got a black lotus and all lands are dual lands. Surprisingly it works
6) Ice Age will not be reviewed. Only half the cards of the original set are available, and the snow mechanic doesn't work. Sorry, but it wouldn't be fair.
7) Portal will be reviewed as a block
8 ) M10-M15 shall be reviewed as a block; The cards belonging to this block shall only include cards that do not appear in any other block (no reprints)
9) the other special sets (e.g. Archenemy, Planechase, Astral) shall not be reviewed.
10) Decks that have been created per the above shall be play-tested against any other deck from any other block that I created in accordance with the above rules.
At this time, I'm approximately halfway through (there are 7 blocks I've not yet looked at, plus M10-M15 and Portal; and thanks to the latest update I need to redo Tempest). I picked the blocks in no particular order, and will post the reviews in no particular order. Keep in mind that before I started writing the reviews below, I had already created, and played with, 170+ decks.
edit: if someone will teach me how, I'll gladly post the decks on here too
2nd Edit: It took me several months to get as far as I did, and I expect it will take several more before I finish (then again, Dragons of Tarkir hasn't been coded yet, and M15 isn't even out yet). If anyone wants to request a review of a particular block, please let me know.
I've recently started playing again thanks to Manalink, and as a thank you, I thought I'd review every block. As I've not lived with the past 20 years of magic, this may be an interesting vantage point.
Here are my deck-building rules, which were used to review the blocks:
1) total singleton: each card may only occur in one deck
1B) Basic lands are of course excepted. Certain lands may instead be restricted to 4 per deck, depending on the card (e.g. painlands, fetchlands, etc.)
2) Hosing cards are generally excluded, as these would not be effective against most decks
3) The maximum number of decks must be created
4) Flavor Matters (e.g. for Theros each god gets a deck, and cards relating to that god must be in that deck)
4B) I will make mistakes here; don't sweat it
5) Early Sets had me stumped for a while, but after some trial and error, I decided to divvy this into two blocks:
a. Unlimited, Arabian Nights & Antiquities
b. Legends, The Dark, Fallen Empire (plus basic and dual lands)
Legends was originally intended to be a stand-alone set, and I treated it as such. Matching the expansions like this keeps the Large-Small-Small expansion format. It also works on a different level, in that Legends, The Dark and Fallen Empire are, from a design perspective, fucking terrible, in a way that Arabian Nights and Antiquities aren't, but more of that when we get to the review.
As an aside, from a flavor perspective it would make more sense for Unlimited-Arabian Nights-Legends (which create/describe the world) and Antiquities-The Dark-Fallen Empire (The Brothers War and the descent toward the Ice Age). In that case, the third block should be Ice Age/Homelands/Coldsnap/Alliances. While the Unlimited block could be made to work, the Brothers War would be 303 mostly useless cards.
5B) Homelands got 1 standalone deck. To make it work, it got a black lotus and all lands are dual lands. Surprisingly it works
6) Ice Age will not be reviewed. Only half the cards of the original set are available, and the snow mechanic doesn't work. Sorry, but it wouldn't be fair.
7) Portal will be reviewed as a block
8 ) M10-M15 shall be reviewed as a block; The cards belonging to this block shall only include cards that do not appear in any other block (no reprints)
9) the other special sets (e.g. Archenemy, Planechase, Astral) shall not be reviewed.
10) Decks that have been created per the above shall be play-tested against any other deck from any other block that I created in accordance with the above rules.
At this time, I'm approximately halfway through (there are 7 blocks I've not yet looked at, plus M10-M15 and Portal; and thanks to the latest update I need to redo Tempest). I picked the blocks in no particular order, and will post the reviews in no particular order. Keep in mind that before I started writing the reviews below, I had already created, and played with, 170+ decks.
edit: if someone will teach me how, I'll gladly post the decks on here too
2nd Edit: It took me several months to get as far as I did, and I expect it will take several more before I finish (then again, Dragons of Tarkir hasn't been coded yet, and M15 isn't even out yet). If anyone wants to request a review of a particular block, please let me know.