08/15/2007 08:47:16

imo, you are very wrong about blue. It is far and away the best colour in the format because it's the colour which best allows you to exploit any skill differential between you and the people you are playing with - Unsummon is a great example of such a card.

As for Aggressive Urge... Firstly, I wouldn't suggest ever having more than 2 in a deck. I think this one comes down to personal experience. Perhaps I haven't been playing against people who were particularly switched on, but if you are green and you can't find a way to play and exploit Aggressive Urge, you are probably in trouble anyway. I may be in the minority but I stick by my opinion in the Urge vs. Growth argument.

08/15/2007 08:38:31

I think unsummon is underrated as well... But blue is pretty bad in XXX from my experience. Essence Drain kills almost everything.

As far as aggressive urge, in the few games of XXX that I've played I encountered a guy with at least 2, if not 3 aggressive urges and I was able to play around them fairly easily. Card advantage is only card advantage if you draw the cards...

08/14/2007 08:57:53

As an aside, Riki, have you seen Nick Eisel's premium article on 10th over on SCG today? A lot of his picks are very very similar to mine.

Fair enough, there's no Demolish on there but Angelic Wall is. And the rest of his red list is identical that mine. Stuff like Unsummon and Snapping Drake over Aven Windreader are all discussed. He overrates Essence Drain - it should have been on my list but not above Terror and Gravedigger. His green list is different to mine and, with hindsight, probably a little closer to the mark than mine. Hey-ho. Good to see that some of my rationale is backed up by someone else though.

We all need to know we aren't complete muppets all of the time ;)

08/14/2007 03:02:17

lol - ok, first tings first. I never said I was an expert on limited - I said I was better at limited than constructed. Not the same thing lad ;)

Windreader - sure that extra point of toughness allows you to swing into a Giant Spider but seems kinda pointless unless you have pump, no? Drake is easier to cast and cheaper. People go on and on about Windreader but Drake is just so much more efficient at what it does.

Essence Drain should be in that list - complete oversight.

I've defended Demolish in the initial blog and I 110% stand by that. Same reason Creeping Mold will almost always be 23rd card when I'm green. Too often I have lost games I was massively in charge of because of a stupid bollocks Warhammer or Angel. So I like Demolish. So there.

Craw and Spined Wurm are interchangeable. I like the extra power of toughness but accept the argument of putting Spiny first, Urge over Growth because the extra +2/+2 is often irrelevant. 'Draw a card' is almost never a bad thing.

I was going to say white in 10th is fairly poor. But Once again, I will defend the Wall. I love UW in 10th and it often takes a wee while longer to set up your board than other archetypes. Wall shuts down the board until you can get board dominance. Cloudchaser should maybe be on there but it's so often just a 2/2 for 4. That bumps into an Angelic Wall. Or a Prowler.

 

I think my picks are fairly non-aggressive and that is where your argument predominately lies. And it would appear that all of your 'issues' are with cards in 4th or 5th in my orders. Apart from maybe Prowler. Hey, it's all good.

You're buying the virtual drinks btw. I'm a Scotsman remember? 

08/13/2007 22:26:01

I thought you were supposed to be the Limited expert? I can understand respect for card advantage; that's well and good, but you have to respect "butt advantage" which is what Aven Windreader has over Snapping Drake. That third point of toughness allows you to swing into Giant Spider, Cloud Elemental, and pretty much any white flyer without fear (without much fear).

I'm glad you have Gravedigger valued nice and high, but what happened to Essence Drain in black?

Demolish? Demolish? Demolish?

Why do you want to pay one whole mana more for one measly power on Craw vs Spined Wurm? Five to six mana is when a lot of decks start to sputter on their land drops without a little help. And Aggressive Urge instead of Giant Growth? Demolish?

You've got a wall in your top five white commons. A wall. Actually, you kinda have two walls if you count Skyhunter Prowler, whose amazing ability to beat for one and play defense has somehow tricked you into thinking it is better than Patrol, or the saving-your-butt-from-random-good-enchantments Aven Cloudchaser.

Demolish?

Dave, I've got an article on Tenth Limited coming up. I don't have full common rankings, but you should show us, we'll have words, and then we can have a virtual drink afterwards as we laugh about how we each think we won the argument. 

08/13/2007 15:53:55

I do like Bond as well but it wouldn't make my top 5.

08/13/2007 15:50:08

i hae found that contaminated bond, a black common, very effective and usually passed along.