Whispers of the Muse: Lawrence M’s ‘Grab for Power’ (M12)
Welcome to the next installment of our Whispers of the Muse, the occasional series where a reader asks for help tinkering with and improving upon a precon deck from the Ertai’s Lament community! Today’s request comes to us from Lawrence M., who would like to improve the Black/Blue Grab for Power deck from Magic 2012. He’s building it almost stock from the box, but says “so far I have purchased 1x Throne Of Empires and 1x Scepter Of Empires.”
“I’m fairly new to the game,” he adds, but mentions that he’d like to make the deck more competitive. As you may recall from our review, Grab for Power is a combo-style deck heavily dependent upon hitting it’s three-card combo (the artifacts of Empires) for maximum effectiveness.
Because Lawrence is a newer player, it may be more helpful to limit suggestions to cards more readily available at his local gaming store, but of course any suggestions for improving the deck’s performance are more than welcome. Here’s the stock list:
So… how would you make the deck better? Let us know in the comments below!
7th Edition: Way Wild Review (Part 1 of 2)
If the monochromatic and simplistic decks of 7th Edition are all about introducing novice players of the day to the feel and philosophies of each of the game’s five colours, any discussion of ‘best-in-show’ on this basis alone would need to consider Way Wild. To be fair, Green isn’t the most sophisticated or complicated colour at the best of times, so perhaps tipping the cap to a simple deck for a simple strategy isn’t much of a stretch, but that isn’t to say that playing Green stompy and smashing face with fat beaters isn’t fun… and at the end of the day isn’t that what the game’s all about?
And that, in a nutshell, is Way Wild. Introducing your enormous creatures to your enemy’s face, repeating over and over again until one or the other raises the white flag. Let’s take a look at the deck and see how its gets us there.
7th Edition: Decay Review (Part 2 of 2)
So far despite the actual card not appearing in the mono-Black intro deck, we’ve heard quite a bit about this Western paladin whose theme and flavour suffuses his 40-card deck. After the hype, would the deck have what it takes to overpower its opponent and clinch victory? Would its mix of disruption and aggression prove the winning formula, or would it be spreading itself too thin against a more focused opponent? To find out, Jimi snapped up the mono-White Armada and looked to put me to the test. Here are the notes from this matchup of opposites.
7th Edition: Decay Review (Part 1 of 2)
In our last review we introduced the concept of the four Paladins that infuse the 7th Edition Core Set with something not-quite-a-storyline, but not-quite, well… not, either. Call it an ‘open-ended story,’ a loose interconnection of otherwise unrelated cards. Although both ‘good’ Paladins are in White, naturally enough, their imprint was barely felt at all in Armada– they’re in the flavour text of one card (Spirit Link) and featured in another (Glorious Anthem). Perhaps its simple humility that compels them to take a back seat to their soliders and healers, but whatever it is the Western Paladin has little interest in it. Indeed, you’ll find him gracing both art and flavour text of a good deal more of the contents of the mono-Black deck, Decay.
7th Edition: Armada Review (Part 2 of 2)
With our opening review under our belt, it’s time to crack open the deck and see how it manages in the field. My opponent for today is Jimi, and naturally enough she has selected the mono-Red Infestation. Will my Soldiers and Knights have the staying power to outlast the Goblin horde? As aggressive as my deck seems to be, hers will be moreso. Can I survive the initial surge to emerge triumphant? Here are our notes from the clash.
7th Edition: Armada Review (Part 1 of 2)
Look to the North, look to the East, look to the West and South
On all horizons storm clouds loom and roll across the sky
So sang the crust punk band Amebix in 1985, but they might just as well have been singing about 2001’s Core Set release, 7th Edition. Although generally not well-regarded by today’s standards, the 7th Edition did have within it a surprising amount of innovation, some of which the like has not been seen since. Every card in the set was granted new art, the first time this had been done since the beginning of the game.
Magic 2012: Sacred Assault Review (Part 2 of 2)
Our final playtest and review for Magic 2012, and the time has just flown by. With each deck having a very distinctive theme, we’ve really enjoyed pittone one against the other. For our last game, Jimi has accepted the challenge to serve as the opposition, selecting Grab for Power as her deck. Fresh off the deck’s successes in our last review she has every reason for optimism, but I’m angling to see how well Sacred Assault will spoil her dream and claim victory. Here are our game notes.
Magic 2012: Sacred Assault Review (Part 1 of 2)
Auras have long been the proverbial red-headed stepchild of Magic. Early in the game, when terms like “card advantage” had yet to be minted, enchanting creatures didn’t seem like such a bad thing to do. You took a creature that perhaps had been outclassed by others and made it better, or made your champion beater just that much stronger. Sure you might lose both cards when that creature died, but it took awhile for the players of the game to understand the full significance of that fact.
But figure it out they did.
And since that time, Wizards has been trying to come up with ways to make playing auras attractive, unwilling to abandon the very basic concept of making the good better. It’s hard to say exactly when this realisation dawned, but it does make for an interesting walk through time to see the ways that R&D have tried to make the aura playable. A few highlights…
Whispers of the Muse: Steve S’s “Mystical Might” (Magic 2012)
We might be on vacation, but Ertai’s Lament never sleeps! We recently received this request from a reader, Steve S., who was looking for ways to improve his Mystical Might deck. With some extra boosters (as well as apparent trace elements of Life for Death and Devouring Skies, and Sacred Assault) of raw material ready to go, here’s what he had to say:
My son and I have just started playing Magic and we really enjoy collecting cards and talking about our decks. Now that we have a good number of extra cards from booster decks, I would like to try improving the Intro deck I just picked up… Mystical Might 2012 Core Deck.
I have switched out a few cards to increase the flying attack and include some other rares I already had but I’m not sure which ones and how many to add without making the mana curve too high. I would like to use the deck in Standard format.
Here is Steve’s current decklist:
Creatures (23)
- 3 Hovermyr
3 Phantasmal Bear
1 Lord of the Unreal
2 Stormfront Pegasus
3 Porcelain Legionnaire
2 Kemba’s Skyguard
4 Aven Fleetwing
2 Phantasmal Dragon
1 Shattered Angel
1 Serra Angel
1 Chancellor of the Spires
Spells (13)
- 3 Oblivion Ring
1 Argentum Armor
2 Cancel
2 Elixir of Immortality
2 Vapor Snag
1 Throne of Empires
2 Mind Control
“However,” said Steve, “I have so many other cards I wish I could use as well. I will list a few and maybe I could get some advice on cards I should be using or ones to look for in trades.”
It’s great to see folks new to the game and already looking to tinker and meddle with what comes right out of the box. Who has some suggestions for them on their deck- what to keep in, what to take out, and what to track down?
Magic 2012: Grab for Power Review (Part 2 of 2)
Thus far we’ve been fairly impressed with the Magic 2012 Intro Pack decks overall, and Grab for Power certainly seems to be one of the most interesting of them all. Being that most rare breed- an intro deck combo archetype- we’ve been very keen to see how easily the trio of artifacts that power the deck are assembled. Would the deck stand a reasonable chance at bringing them together? Would it be somewhere between a snipe hunt and quest for the Hoyl Grail? And just as importantly- how would the deck fare in the absence of its combo? To answer these questions and more, I squared off with Jimi who opted to play Entangling Webs. Let’s see how the deck did.
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