Subject: Green - To Clarify Date: Wed, 17 Jun 1998 07:57:28 -0400 From: "Jamie & Mare" Organization: ISPNews http://ispnews.com Newsgroups: rec.games.trading-cards.magic.strategy I'm having a blast with my secret Force deck - and have a report up at the Dojo now - and I have posted a report to these newsgroups - but I think my server lost it. I posted it two days ago - and I don't see anything posted yet to the newsgreoups - so maybe I'll post it again this afternoon. But - Some people will look at the report and say - "Wakefield - what are you whining about? You've now take the deck to three consecutive final finishes?" Green doesn't suck!" Well, let me clarify what I have always said. The themes of the other colors have been expanding, and making the other colors stronger and more defined. Red - land dest. direct damage. creatures with celerity. global destruction. artifact destruction. utility weenies and weenies that even destroy land. shadow defense in the form of direct damage, shadow storm, and a great wall. o.k. buyback spells. Black- land dest. shadow. discard. speed. card drawing. graveyard as a resource more than any other color. fat creatures at the expense of life or a sac. excellent buyback. good flyers. good evasion. Blue - friggin blue! - library manipulation. card drawing. by far the best flyers. great weenies, great fatties. evasion, unkillable creatures. bounce. oh, did I forget counters? shadow, and the most and best buyback. White - protection, completely undercosted weenies, excellent shadow, limited spot creature removal, but the best mass creature removal and mass land removal. bad buyback, but not pathetic. healing. the best spot enchantment and artifact removal- and - as instants. Green - fat creatures. expensive artifact and enchantment removal, creatures that double as mana generation. putting land into play. land destruction. limited top of library manipulation. Now - I may be missing something - but I would like to state some things that we all thought, but never materialized. Green starts to become the untargetability color - this has been dropped and moved to another color. Green started to get some good artifact and enchatment removal in the form of emerald charm, uktabi monkey, and creeping mold. this has also left us. Green gets some buyback, but there is none of it in any of the top decks. Ever. Its jut not worth it to even mention it. Green is extremely vulnerable to shadow, and our only defense is a cantrip, and a 2/1 creature. green's spot enchantment and artifact removal will soon rotate out and we will be left with the extremely over costed verdigris and near worthless tranquility. no new themes. no good buyback - none at all in exodus. no creature elim - with creatures like tradewind around - this is just sad. no good flyers - another form of evasion. no good library manipulation without some shuffling effect - two card combo anyone? no phasing. 1 flanker no new land destruction in exodus and soon creeping mold will be gone - so green land dest. will be dead - correct? O.k.? does anyone see a pattern here? I don't mean to harp on this - but it takes weeks and week and weeks of testing to make a semi viable green deck - and it takes minutes to throw together a passable red, blue or black deck. thats all - I'm not saying green can't be strong, and I'm not saying green doesn't have some excellent cards, and I'm not saying green can't be a great support color. All I'm stating is that green keeps getting passed over for its themes. It never seems to get any of the new game mechanics, or else they are token gestures. And it never gets any new themes. Its never expanded on what it can do. meanwhile - the other colors keep getting more and more defined. thats all . later Jamie C. Wakefield