Subject: Strategy Post: Humility
Date: 4 Nov 1997 00:07:32 GMT
From: efertik@netaxs.com (Elliot Fertik)
Newsgroups: rec.games.trading-cards.magic.strategy

With the release of a major set like Tempest, you would expect to see
posts on this group talking about some of the new cards in the set that
could change the Type II scene in various ways.  But with some very
noteworthy exceptions (e.g. Shuller's excellent post on the Vineyard), not
much of this has been posted.  Well, in an attempt to take up the slack,
I'm going to talk a bit about what may well be the most powerful card in
Tempest: Humility.

First of all, the text:

Humility

WW22

All creatures lose all abilities and become 1/1.

***

Essentially, this card turns every creature on the board into overcosted
Dwarven Traders.  I'm not going to get into the various rules questions
that this card invokes;  go to the rules newsgroup and follow the various
Humility threads there.

Humility, it strikes me, may be the best anti-creature enchantment since
Moat or Abyss.  While it doesn't eliminate or nullify the creatures
altogether, it turns them into very easy to handle 1/1's.  In a classic
creatureless control deck, this is pure gold;  it gives you more time to
hold them off, since you are only taking 1/round from unblocked creatures,
and it is easier to nuke them (no prot, easily Earthquaked, etc.).

I think most people, when they looked at this card, realized its power;
I'm just suprised that I haven't seen it incorporated into more Type II
decks yet (judging from the new tourney reports, most of the new Type II
winning decks are mono-blue capsize).  I think this card could revive the
old Weisman-style control decks.  Therefore, without further ado, I
present the first draft of a post-nov. 1 Type II b/w control deck using
humility

4 Counterspell
4 Memory Lapse
3 Dissipate
2 Capsize
3 Humility
4 Wrath of God
3 Earthquakes
2 Spirit Mirrors
4 Disenchant
1 Greater Realm of Preservation
2 Meditate
1 Enlightened Tutor
1 Whispers of the Muse

4 Akakar Wastes
2 Calderal Lakes
2 R/W painlands (forgot name)
3 Undiscovered Paradise
2 Reflecting Pool
1 City of Brass
7 Islands
7 Plains

I chose blue/white mostly because it is the classic "control" deck, and
red/white (the other choice) is much too vulnerable to armageddon.
Obviously, the deck probably needs work, but it seems to me this is the
type of deck that can best abuse humility.

Anyway, comments, questions, etc. are welcomed.

-Elliot Fertik