Let's Play Elder Dragon Highlander 40,000

I kinda got back into Magic: the Gathering around 2017, and have played the odd game since. So when Wizards published 40k Commander decks, I felt I had to get the Chaos one. Now that I have that, and the F1 this year is so mortally boring, I've decided to take the plunge and actually try playing Commander.

**

The deck I've got started life as the Chaos 40k commander deck. I kept Abaddon as my commander, swapped out some cards I didn't like or that felt way too complicated, and tried to make the lands a bit more interesting.

Creature: (28)

Abaddon the Despoiler

Lord of Change

Be'lakor, the Dark Master

Bloodthirster

Keeper of Secrets

Mortarion, Daemon Primarch

Chaos Defiler

Great Unclean One

Helbrute

Heralds of Tzeentch

Knight Rampager

Lucius the Eternal

Magnus the Red

Noise Marine

Pink Horror

The Balrog, Flame of Udûn

Aspiring Champion

Bloodcrusher of Khorne

Chaos Terminator Lord

Exalted Flamer of Tzeentch

Dark Apostle

Plague Drone

Seeker of Slaanesh

Tzaangor Shaman

Venomcrawler

Herald of Slaanesh

Poxwalkers

Tallyman of Nurgle

Sorcery: (7)

Blasphemous Act

Decree of Pain

Let the Galaxy Burn

Blight Grenade

Deny Reality

Mandate of Abaddon

Pyroclasm

Instant: (12)

Blood for the Blood God!

Thunderous Wrath

Bituminous Blast

Kill! Maim! Burn!

Nurgle's Conscription

Chaos Warp

Ionize

Bile Blight

Reverberate

Snap

Brainstorm

Dark Ritual

Artifact: (9)

Chromatic Lantern

Commander's Sphere

Pristine Talisman

Sol Grail

Worn Powerstone

Talisman of Creativity

Talisman of Dominance

Talisman of Indulgence

Sol Ring

Enchantment: (4)

Warstorm Surge

The Ruinous Powers

The Lost and the Damned

Nurgle's Rot

Land: (40)

Barren Moor

Command Tower

Crumbling Necropolis

Desolate Lighthouse

Dismal Backwater

Exotic Orchard

Foreboding Ruins

Forgotten Cave

Island x6

Lonely Sandbar

Mountain x6

Path of Ancestry

Rogue's Passage

Snow-Covered Island

Snow-Covered Mountain

Snow-Covered Swamp

Sunken Hollow

Swamp x7

Swiftwater Cliffs

Tainted Isle

Temple of Malice

Temple of the False God

Wasteland

**

I took this deck to my first ever Magic event, a Casual Commander day at our friendly local game store. 

I included Rogue's Passage in the deck because it did great work for me in Magic: Duels on the XBox, and it paid off when I sent The Balrog, Flame of Udûn down it to knock out my last remaining opponent. I then got obliterated by an endless swarm of Daleks, and the third game I was in was at a level I barely understood. But I had a great time.

**

The second time around, the young people were fairly astonished by my Sol Grail, and I again managed to win my first game!

I didn't really get much use out of Abaddon's ability to grant Cascade in my first event. I feel like the Ruinous Powers deck is trying to be at least two things at once: a Demon tribal deck and a spellslinger/Cascade deck, and it isn't that great at either. So I decided to go all in on the demons and make Be'lakor my commander. Again, I had good fun playing, and won one and lost one game.

In my third event, my Aspiring Champion got me a spectacular win. There were four of us and one other aggro deck, and everyone's life total was low. I had Be'lakor on the field sent my Aspiring Champion to attack another player through Rogue's Passage. Sacrificing him, I managed to draw Orcus, Prince of Undeath. The damage from Orcus showing up knocked out two players, and the damage from Be'lakor took out the third one. It was a lovely Nethack 40,000 moment.

**

So, I've been to three Casual Commander events, and I've had a lot of fun. This is the deck list I've ended up with:

Be'lakor, the Dark Master

Artifact: (9)

Chromatic Lantern

Commander's Sphere

Pristine Talisman

Sol Grail

Whispersilk Cloak

Worn Powerstone

Arcane Signet

Thought Vessel

Sol Ring

Creature: (25)

Lord of Change

Bloodthirster

Keeper of Secrets

Mortarion, Daemon Primarch

Chaos Defiler

Great Unclean One

Heralds of Tzeentch

Lucius the Eternal

Magnus the Red

Noise Marine

Pink Horror

Renegade Demon

Sol'kanar the Swamp King

The Balrog, Flame of Udûn

Aspiring Champion

Bloodcrusher of Khorne

Chaos Terminator Lord

Exalted Flamer of Tzeentch

Orcus, Prince of Undeath

Plague Drone

Seeker of Slaanesh

Soulstinger

Venomcrawler

Baleful Ammit

Herald of Slaanesh

Enchantment: (5)

Warstorm Surge

Coastal Piracy

The Ruinous Powers

Phyrexian Arena

Nurgle's Rot

Instant: (12)

Blood for the Blood God!

Bituminous Blast

Kill! Maim! Burn!

Nurgle's Conscription

Chaos Warp

Ionize

Bile Blight

Boomerang

Snap

Brainstorm

Dark Ritual

Mystical Tutor

Sorcery: (8)

Blasphemous Act

Decree of Pain

Blight Grenade

Deny Reality

Mandate of Abaddon

Stronghold Discipline

Lash of the Balrog

Void Snare

Land: (40)

Barren Moor

Command Tower

Crumbling Necropolis

Desolate Lighthouse

Dismal Backwater

Foreboding Ruins

Forgotten Cave

Island ×6

Lonely Sandbar

Mortuary Mire

Mountain ×7

Path of Ancestry

Rogue's Passage

Snow-Covered Island

Snow-Covered Mountain

Snow-Covered Swamp

Sunken Hollow

Swamp ×6

Swiftwater Cliffs

Tainted Peak

Temple of Epiphany

Temple of Malice

Temple of the False God

Wasteland

MtG: Vintage Izzet

"So you can cast a few spells? Am I supposed to be impressed?"
- Skyrim, guard dialogue

I got back into Magic: the Gathering a while ago with the Mind vs Might duel decks, which I thought were fun. So I figured that if I'm going to make some kind of deck for myself, I might as well base it on that. Therefore:

Izzet Mind 2.0

Creature (14)

Enigma Drake
Glorybringer
2 Goblin Electromancer
Jeskai Windscout
Jhessian Thief
Jori En, Ruin Diver
Monastery Swiftspear
Nivix Cyclops
Reef Pirates
Sanguinary Mage
Talrand, Sky Summoner
2 Young Pyromancer

Sorceries (12)

Beacon of Tomorrows
2 Empty the Warrens
Grapeshot
Pieces of the Puzzle
2 Pore Over the Pages
Pyroclasm
2 Rift Bolt
Rise from the Tides
Temporal Fissure

Instants (7)

Electrolyze
Magma Spray
Mystical Tutor
2 Savage Alliance
Snap
Thunderous Wrath

Artifacts (2)

Library of Leng
Primal Amulet

Enchantments (1)

Firemind's Research

Lands (24)

Desolate Lighthouse
2 Highland Lake
6 Island
6 Mountain
Mystic Monastery
Rogue's Passage
Sand Silos
Smoldering Spires
Snow-Covered Island
Snow-Covered Mountain
Soaring Seacliff
Temple of Epiphany
Temple of the False God

Sideboard

Electrostatic Field
Hypothesizzle
Ionize
Mission Briefing
Psychic Transfer

**

Somewhat to my surprise, this deck is only legal in Vintage, because it includes Mystical Tutor.

In general, I've tried to go for creatures with Prowess or some other ability linked to instants and sorceries; spells that are either cheap or come with untapping lands or card draw; and just generally what I consider beautiful cards that at least somewhat fit the theme. I also have a Snow-Covered Mountain, because, well, I have one from back in the day. Rogue's Passage and Glorybringer won me more games than I can easily count in Magic Duels, so how was I supposed to not bring them? So you see that this isn't exactly a ruthlessly efficient deck-building philosophy.

**



The first time, I couldn't find any lands, and ended up being seriously outnumbered. I did get to use Pyroclasm to wipe everyone out, but I lost in fairly short order. It's hard to claw back an early disadvantage!

Next time, I did better. I managed to get off enough spells for a horde of zombies with Rise from the Tides and to transform Primal Amulet, for an even bigger horde of goblins from Empty the Warrens, which did the trick in the end.

**

So, what have I learned? First, that I feel my deckbuilding kind of succeeded, because I managed to keep the key property of the Mind deck: it mostly just straight up loses, except when you can tee up a proper combo with your instants and sorceries. I'm unreasonably delighted by this. More importantly, it reminded me that playing Magic can be very good fun.

The most beautiful Magic: the Gathering cards

Now that I've returned to Magic, I want to take a moment to talk about the cards. Especially in an era of digital entertainment, part of the appeal of any card game is having the actual physical cards to handle, shuffle and look at. With Magic, this is what my high school history teacher would have called a double-barreled sword. On the one hand, I have to be honest: in terms of overall looks and design, getting back to Magic has strongly reminded me of how well-designed the cards of the Lord of the Rings living card game are. They are just lovely in a way that I think Magic cards have never been. But what Magic has going for it is sheer scale. With over 15 000 different cards, several with multiple versions, there's a huge library of cards to discover and rediscover, and whole boatloads of art. Some of it is, frankly, incredibly good.

To start with, here are some of our favorite contemporary(ish) Magic cards. We're great fans of Magali Villeneuve from her work on the Lord of the Rings card game; Arwen and Éowyn are staples of our decks and simply gorgeous cards. She's been doing more work for Magic lately, like the spectacular Wildfire Eternal for Hour of Devastation:

Her women are on another level altogether, though; Dulcet Sirens and Scrapper Champion are particular favorites of mine, but the best of the lot is surely Titania, Protector of Argoth.

Another fantastic current artist is Cynthia Sheppard, whose Shadow Alley Denizen is simply beautiful.

Dark Salvation is also a favorite of mine.

Mike Lim aka Daarken is another prominent exponent of these darker themes, with lovely cards like Shipwreck Singer and Bloodhusk Ritualist:

Looking at these images, it might not be entirely unfair to guess that he's a bit of a Luis Royo fan. That's okay, though, so are we. Here's a Barony Vampire:

For whatever reason, vampires seem to get some of the best art, but so do their opposite numbers, so to speak; as a theologian I'd be remiss if I didn't post at least one angel, so here's Avacyn, the Purifier by James Ryman.

**

The above, I think, are fair examples of some of the best of the current line of Magic cards: almost hyperrealistic contemporary fantasy art of fairly uniform quality. Of course, this wasn't always the case. In older Magic sets, the quality and nature of the art varied wildly. You could get comic book art or an impressionist painting; it might be brilliant, and it might be awful. This is where you find the ugliest cards, but in my opinion, also the most beautiful. Rather than giving you a practically photorealistic depiction of what the card was supposed to represent, the older art often left you with a lot more room for imagination.

I talked about my enduring love for lands in my last post on Magic, and I think this is why I'm so fond of them. There are lots of great examples, but one that particularly stuck with me was Academy Ruins by Zoltan Boros and Gabor Szikszai.

There are lots of other lands I could mention, like Brian Snoddy's take on Urza's Power Plant, John Avon's Lantern-lit Graveyard and Submerged Boneyard by Chris Childs, and many others. Of the two-color lands that are a prominent feature of Magic Duels, I think my favorite is Highland Lake, by Florian de Gesincourt.

While I think these lands are very beautiful, none of them really stop me in my tracks. For that, we have to go back all the way to Urza's Saga, which came out in the fall of 1998, when I was starting high school. It included what I genuinely think is one of the most beautiful and evocative cards of all time, Lingering Mirage by Jerry Tiritilli.

This card has everything for me: the boat, the dramatic swell of the ocean and the wonderful range of blues in the water, from the greenish water in the distance to the dramatic dark blue in the foreground. The massively exaggerated curve of the horizon gives the picture an air of unreality, reminding you that this isn't just a painting of a boat, but a Magic card. And it really is a painting printed onto a collectible card.

Of course, this isn't a feature restricted to older cards: one of the most beautiful Magic cards ever, Seek the Wilds by Anna Steinbauer, is from the Battle for Zendikar block.

This is where my bias in favor of the older cards really shows up, though. I think Seek the Wilds is a fantastic card with wonderful art. But compared to some of the older art like Lingering Mirage, Seek the Wilds leaves less room for the imagination. It feels, perhaps paradoxically, like a more direct representation of its subject than the older, more organic images. Lingering Mirage invites me to stop and look at it closely and think about it. Seek the Wilds is just a really cool picture.

While we're on the subject of old cards, by the way, I do have to mention a card that may not be the most beautiful piece of art you'll ever see, but is by far the most kickass depiction of a badger ever: Rysorian Badger by Heather Hudson.

That is literally a badger playing a drum solo on someone's skull with their bones. You just don't get art that awesome any more. Heather Hudson also did the art for Lonely Sandbar, an amazingly beautiful card which returns us to our nautical theme.

I make no apologies for featuring ships and the sea so prominently here; having grown up by the seaside, I love them, but I also genuinely feel that for whatever reason, disproportionately many of the most beautiful Magic cards I've ever seen have featured both. A case in point is what I'd nominate as the second-most beautiful card in all of Magic: Exploration, by Brian Snoddy.

One of the particular charms of Magic has always been that it isn't tied to a particular setting. Not only does this mean that designers have a very free hand in inventing new settings and themes, but also that cards don't necessarily have to be in any way tied to any of them. They can even represent completely abstract concepts, like Exploration does. Here the combination of the title and image, but also just the image alone, suggest a story, but they leave it to your imagination. In my opinion, that's what makes truly great card art.

Finally, it's time for what I believe is the most beautiful card ever created for Magic: the Gathering. All the way from Fifth Edition, it's Reef Pirates by Tom Wänerstrand.

Everything I said about Exploration is true here, and then some. The flavor text is also pretty good, and works with the image and title to give you the idea that this is a snapshot from a much bigger story that you're free to fill in on your own. But the art itself is simply wonderful. The sky is simply amazing, and a perfect contrast with the brilliant emerald water. And the sails! Look at the sails! For me, this card has everything, from story to craftsmanship.

So yeah, I still feel that the Lord of the Rings living card game has better quality cards in general. But when it comes to individual cards that make you stop and think and feel, you'll find them in Magic.

Let's Play Magic: the Gathering: Mind vs. Might Duel Decks

I mentioned ages ago that before we got into this whole living card game thing, the previous time I played any kind of card game that wasn't either bridge or poker was with a Magic: the Gathering Ice Age starter set.

The thing about Magic is that as near as I can tell, Richard Garfield pretty much invented the modern collectible card game. All the other card games we play, whether Lord of the Rings, Game of Thrones or Arkham Horror, use mechanics that are functionally almost identical to those in Magic. So you might even go so far as to say that this is also a project of historical interest.

This summer, I happened to find what I think is a Revised Edition Mountain card hanging around our summer cottage. I used it as a bookmark, which is probably what made the idea of playing again start to grow on me.

So eventually the inevitable happened. If I remember my university classes correctly, Islamic theology maintains that everyone is born a Muslim, but not everyone manages to stick with it. Therefore, one does not convert to Islam but rather returns to it. Something similar seems to be true about Magic; at any rate, I, too, returned.

Our friendly local gaming store had some 7th edition starter sets hanging around, and we grabbed one. The starter set gives you one blue-white deck and one red-green one, with a booklet explaining the rules. Ours was a Finnish edition, and I have to say that the translation was very well done! The rulebook gives a reasonably good walkthrough to a sort of pre-scripted game; once it leaves you on your own, though, my blue-white deck had the edge in some surprisingly powerful creatures, and my partner ended up being overrun by bunnies.

We were also given a pair of 2016 Welcome Decks for free, so our FLGS really treats us pretty well. Admittedly this already added up to a reasonable total of cards to get started with, but I figured we could do better. Duel Decks seemed the best way to get stuck in with more contemporary Magic, and I picked the Mind vs. Might Decks to kind of go with our Lord of the Rings decks; since my partner plays mono-Tactics, the red-green Might deck seemed like the best match, while the red-blue Mind deck was close enough to my favorite sphere, Spirit.

In our first game - the first time I played Magic with real cards this millenium - I got off to a decent start before being destroyed by Rubblebelt Raiders. Knew I should've kept that Rift Bolt in reserve...

The second time around, it was my turn. First I got Young Pyromancer out, which meant a pile of Fire Elementals, and then I set up a combo of several spells next turn followed by Empty the Warrens; at the end of the turn, I controlled seven Fire Elemental tokens and eight Goblins, which promptly overran my opponent.

Next time, I lost in fairly short order, but I did get to drop a meteor on a tree, so it wasn't all bad.

So far, then, our limited testing bears out what I'd read about the Mind vs Might duel decks online: especially the Might deck is accessible to new players, and most of the time Mind will lose, unless it can pull off a spectacular combo and win by miles. Most importantly, especially if you know the above going in, it's damn good fun.

**

I also quite enjoyed Magic Duels on the Xbox, until about a month before Hour of Destruction came out, it was abruptly announced that it would no longer be supported. This is just a weird decision; they had no replacement to announce, but suddenly decided to pull the plug on the previous project anyway. Like the community, I too was surprised and disappointed, as I'd been looking forward to Hour of Destruction on Duels. Admittedly I hadn't spent any money on it, but frankly, if support for their video games is liable to just vanish into thin air with no warning, why would I? Surely the point of a free-to-play Magic video game is to advertise the physical product. Duels was doing pretty well at that.

Now, though, with no new cards coming and the AI opponent endlessly stuck playing the same Amonkhet staples, Duels feels pointless. Instead, I went and got Elder Scrolls: Legends, also a free-to-play collectible card game.

Legends is like Magic, except your mana increases each turn instead of having lands (which is like Hearthstone?), you can't play cards in the other player's turn (which is boring) and creatures are played into one of two lanes. It's not bad, actually!

**

Thanks to Magic: Duels, though, my partner fell in love with Filigree Familiar, so we now also own a Kaladesh bundle.

I have no objections to this: I used a number of Kaladesh cards in Magic: Duels, and I also quite like the art. For example, Kaladesh includes what I think is my favorite Mountain, an almost Roerichesque piece by Eytan Zana.

Because co-op games are our real passion and neither of us has any real interest in competitive play of any kind, our Magic hobby will mostly be a collecting one, which puts a premium on pretty cards.

**

So, reviews. The 7th edition starter decks were all right. My main complaints are that the card choices really aren't very inspired, especially if the aim is to use these sets to introduce people to Magic. Also, the way our decks were stacked, the Silver deck won overwhelmingly and the Gold player just had nothing they could really do about it. So not ideal. However, I do have to mention the translation again, because it's just very good compared to the kind of thing you usually find in products like these. So that, at least, was a pleasant surprise. Basically the starter set did a pretty good job of walking a new player through the basics of Magic, but with surprisingly boring cards.

Magic: Duels was actually pretty good, but then it was discontinued in such a callous way that it's kind of hard to see the point any more. The Elder Scrolls: Legends is better, and I guess we can expect it to be around for a while? Maybe? Anyway if you're into things like Magic I'd give it a shot; the story mode is an enjoyable enough experience. Also, by the way, several of the Legends cards are pretty enough that I'd be quite happy to buy actual physical copies.

Finally, the Mind vs Might duel decks were good fun, and at least for us, an entirely reasonable way for a new player and a very rusty one to get stuck in again. I'm pretty sure you could do a lot worse for a first or returning purchase to contemporary Magic.