Blue mages work behind the scenes, scheming and stealing secrets, controlling their environments completely before making a move. Nekrataal, Uktabi Orangutan, and Knight of the Mists were just three of these powerhouses. ), turning a stalemated game into an instant-win with your hordes now free to march unopposed through enemy territory. In addition, it could potentially be reused if you had additional bounce spells. Each block has a different threshold of development. A 4/4 flyer that absolutely dominates the air for four mana. In Judgment, Wizards decided that blue should give blue the best "Pacifism effect" in the block, beating Kirtar's Desire and Cagemail for utter efficiency. Use FlashBack Screen Recorder to make recordings you'll want to share. Probably the single most frustrating card in Magic to play against that doesn't involve killing someone on the first turn with a massive combo. There are nine types of blue cards that made this list. Curiosity from Exodus just barely missed making the list. But if you know that one player that always plays blue, this red counterspell will work perfectly. The spell card is exiled when the spell leaves the stack. Now this is everything that Aboshan wasn't: unkillable tapping creatures on a rampage. In that spirit, I give you the official rules of Ben's Top 50 Blue Limited Cards of all Time! Zuran Spellcaster (Ice Age/Alliances), Suq'Ata Firewalker (Mirage/Visions/Weatherlight), Rootwater Hunter (Tempest/Stronghold/Exodus), Thornwind Faeries (Saga/Legacy/Destiny), Stinging Barrier (Masques/Nemesis/Prophecy). In a format laden with game-turning and ending bombs, Morphling still stood heads and shoulders above the rest as probably the best creature in limited of all time. Sure, your opponent might have ten beasts in their green deck, but Callous Oppressor would still be able to steal their four goblins, three elves, and two other creatures that weren't beasts. An unnamed 15-year-old boy was put in front of a Helsingborg district court for beating and abusing a classmate for having blue eyes. Pacifism really hit the flavor of white pretty well - it was removal that wasn't really permanent removal (Pacifism itself could be removed), but it kept the creature at bay indefinitely. While you have used up your card, the enemy has broken even by having one creature swapped for another one. The majority of blue’s ability to handle cards on the field is either temporary or reversible. Evasion creatures win limited games, since there are few ways to block them. Blue’s “polymorph” cards are controversial, but they are card disadvantage and a variant on shrinking cards. At the cost of two cards, you can keep an entire board free of creatures. (Saga/Legacy/Destiny & Odyssey/Torment/Judgment). They serve to give your side of the board tempo by allowing your creatures to attack (removing defenders), giving you more time to set up the board (removing attackers/expensive creatures), and allow for combat tricks (saving your creatures after damage is on the stack. The common consensus in Onslaught/Legions/Scourge draft was that you wouldn't want to play a deck with more than two colors, since there weren't many cards which allowed you to "mana fix" - that is, fetch a third color of mana. This generally makes bounce effects weaker than those that destroy cards outright. That's four turns of Time Ebb plus blocking - and losing that many draws in a row while your opponent continues to develop their board will not lead to many victories. How to fix and claim Twitch drops • Elder Scrolls Online, Last minute Christmas gift guide for every gamer on any budget, Valorant Beginner’s Guide: 5 must-know tips & tricks, How to increase your FPS in Cyberpunk 2077 on PC. For only one more mana than Remove Soul, you outright countered any creature your opponent cast, plus got to draw a card! Zoopin Leather Deck Box with Built-in Spinning Life Counter, Blue for MTG,Yugioh,Pokeman,TES Legacy,Munchkins CCG Decks and Also Small Tokens or Dice- Hold 100 Sleeved Cards or 150 Naked Cards … 4.8 out of 5 stars 50 The Card Image Gallery is updated every day with the latest card previews. Invasion was filled with mana fixing cards, other sets had their Rampant Growth effects and even multiple-color unfriendly Odyssey had common lands which could be sacrificed for a third color in a pinch. Playing faerie vandal is a great creature for sea dasher Octopus to draw cards. This extra toughness made Tradewind Rider nigh unkillable, and once it hit the board, it could completely dominate for all the reasons that reusable bounce dominates limited games as outlined above. Cards such as Deep Freeze or Waterknot work by enchanting an enemy creature to keep it from being useful. These are almost always rare and cost a lot of mana, so they aren’t a usual method of interaction. Zero mana effects which make all of your creatures into evasion creatures seem quite unfair. The copywrite line? Download a PDF with all the cards nicely lined out, print the PDF, cut it, and your deck is ready! Because of this Alexi was one of the most highly coveted bombs in a format lacking in bombs. Need to remove a blocker - or multiple ones? While this takes it off the field, your opponent will still have the problem card in their hand and can play it next turn. While this may seem like a hard kill spell at first, in function it is just a more permanent version of blue’s ability to weaken creatures. After all, Sir Charles had woken me up the night before by lowering his ever-fragrant butt onto my face at three in the morning. Suddenly you could splash Twisted Abomination and a single Swamp - if you drew the Swamp, you could play the Abomination, and if you didn't draw the Swamp and drew the Abomination, you could fetch the Swamp and thin your deck. The first rare "bomb" on this list, Day of the Dragons turns all of your creatures into 5/5 flying monsters. Suddenly, combat damage stacked and effects could happen before said damage was dealt. Even late game, Undo could take out two key blockers allowing for your creatures to swing in for that last few damage. Glimmer of Genius doesn't just supply cards though: it offers card selection with it's scry 2 ability, provides two energy, and can be cast at instant speed. What's better than a 4/4 wall for three mana? While mana intensive, the ability to repeatedly refute an opponent's turn by bouncing their guy combined with the ability to use Disappear as a way to "protect" your creatures in combat (cast Disappear on it and then attack freely, knowing you can save it from lethal damage) made for a very potent enchantment that acted more as a sorcery than an enchantment. Steal = A card that lets you steal something from your opponent. Opponent slow on the mana development? Buyback was supposed to be a Tempest Block mechanic, but Disappear borrowed heavily from that block to bring a reusable Unsummon to Urza's Destiny. In modern times, however, blue’s abilities are tied mostly to card draw and countermagic. Think of the Djinn as Illusionary Forces with a different type of upkeep. Tutor = A card that lets you search your deck for a specific card. Early board development is essential to winning, and most (with an exception or two) reactive strategies fail no matter which limited format you're playing. It's just hard to get as excited about a one toughness Tim when a format is filled with a billion and a half removal spells in the common slot, and where you can already be at five life by the time your Tim becomes active! One of the best five creatures in Magic, but only the fifth best blue card. This site provides accurate and independent information on more than 500.000 Magic the Gathering Decks, tournaments and magic singles prices. Until the advent of land cycling creatures, Krosan Tusker and Explosive Vegetation seemed like the only feasible solutions to get a third color of mana in a draft. In rare cases, blue can also destroy or exile a creature and replace it with a different one. After the changes to combat damage, Wizard Mentor became absolutely insane, allowing you to attack and block with complete and absolute impunity, since you could stack combat damage and save your creatures at will. Blue is the color that draws the most cards, so its removal tends to be card disadvantage. MTG PRINT - Proxy Magic Decks. Mtgdecks.net ©2009-2021. Jim Harbor is a writer of articles, plays, comics, songs  and animation. They lose their creature, and I lose my Murder card. The Magic: The Gathering Creative Team began a new approach to Magic's storyline starting with Odyssey. Obviously better cards rank higher than not as good cards. Remember people: damage did not "go on the stack" back before Urza's Destiny. For four mana, one creature gets neutralized. It also can be cycled for one blue in a pinch. Then again, it was awfully pretentious of you to play blue, the color of rah-sha-sha and utter aristocratdom. Therefore, commons are given more weight than uncommons, which are turn given more weight than rares. Since blue had a disproportionate number of evasion creatures compared to the other colors in a block filled with very low-powered cards, Coastal Piracy allowed the blue mage to draw multiple cards a turn in the hopes of keeping up with the white mage and his ever-growing arsenal of tutored rebels. In Urza Block limited, Morphling can come down on turn six and win on turn ten unassisted. Commander is a different way to play Magic: The Gathering. NederMagic is een online winkel voor Magic the Gathering tradingcards. You can learn more about our database at our Google Dataset. Sure, Kaervek's Torch can kill one creature or be sent to the dome for the win, Ray of Command would generate at minimum two-for-one card advantage every time it was cast. The most common form of blue removal is “bounce,” which simply returns a card to its owner’s hand. So good that it was banned along with Juggernaut and Kird Ape in Extended since the inception of the format. Well, I refused. The best non-rare Spellshaper, Waterfront Bouncer was perhaps the most powerful common in the format in and of itself. Paste a deck in Magic Arena format and click "print". Just between you and me, there have been more wrong Fact or Fiction splits in Magic history than correct ones. We're into the top ten now, and here comes the bounce full force! Part of the charm of bounce is that your opponent will have to reinvest resources to recast that creature a following turn. Each has key strengths and weaknesses that help to ensure the game’s balance. on August 15, 2003. These creatures from various blocks all served the same purpose as the Study/Gift, but at the cost of one card and three mana (or four mana in the case of Stinging Barrier). Capture your desktop, websites, video calls – anything on your PC screen, along with webcam and mic. By the same token, without the kicker Jilt is an overcosted Unsummon - although I can't stress enough how important bounce spells are in limited for blue. An opponent might get out a first turn Jackal Pup, follow it with a second turn Dauthi Horror, and cap those off with a Mogg Fanatic and Dauthi Slayer on turn three, but your third turn Propaganda would ensure that you didn't take a full seven damage to the noggin on turn four. Blue's allies are White and Black, while its e… The quintessential combat trick in all of limited Magic, Ray of Command was a first pick card virtually on the caliber with red X-spells back when they were common. That was it. Well, it's not quite that bad. Back in Mirage, Wizards created a removal spell for white called Pacifism. Every single color had three mana "Grey Ogres" (2/2's for three mana) and four mana "Hill Giants" (3/3's for four mana). How about a 4/4 wall that can attack if the opponent controls Islands, and cycles to boot! Last I checked, Mind Rot plus Dream Cache would cost and two cards, not . King Crab filled a very important niche for blue: a huge creature that could not only block opposing fatties, but send most of them straight back to the top of an opponent's deck. While Morphling might be a great constructed card (foreshadowing), it won't win games unless backed by counterspells and other blue accoutrements. This means that by turn "X," if you don't have a creature to drop, you are going to fall behind on board development. On the other hand, the blue-colored Disperse gives your opponent card advantage. This cleared the way for attackers, and took care of bothersome utility creatures. Psionic Gift and Hermetic Study are fine, but they require a two card investment: the creature you are enchanting, and the enchantment itself. Some were more important than others: For instance, Stinging Barrier was a first pick in its block, since the block was slow, creatures had low toughnesses, and low powers. This is why there is such a premium on flying and unblockable creatures - they are hard to kill in combat, the #1 way to kill creatures in sealed and draft. Cards are ranked based upon a number of factors. That's a heavy commitment to blue to take in the first pack. I played it in a couple of Leagues and it seemed fine, going something like 6-4, but a bunch of players have been putting up 5-0 results with it, so it is surely worth a try. If a single color had strong and diverse removal like white and unconditional card draw like blue, it would destroy the balance of the game. Remember how I mentioned that Blue was the color of slowing things down during the hectic days of Tempest Block limited? Twitter. An interesting thing occurred at the last third of Urza Block limited: Wizards of the Coast changed the rules of Magic. Masques Block limited was defined by Rebel decks: you either had them or you had to have a way to beat them. When a player sets up an Upheaval, there are very few instances they should lose. I meant any creature capable of dealing damage, from Thornwind Faeries to anything with a Hermetic Study. That's power. Along with white, blue holds the most fliers and is the color with unconditional unblockable creatures. Blue mages work behind the scenes, scheming and stealing secrets, controlling their environments completely before making a move. That's what made Thirst special: unlike Frozen Solid and Dehydration, it tapped the creature RIGHT NOW, taking it out of combat for as long as you're willing to pay a blue mana. A 3/2 flyer that effectively couldn't be blocked was pretty much a bomb, since there were few removal spells, fewer fliers, and virtually no tempo in this format. Magic the Gathering and Magic Online prices, decks and strategy. Aaron has an Artful Dodge in his graveyard. Suddenly you have five power worth of creature on the board against their empty territory. Hoser = A card that hoses an opponent's strategy. If you waited until turn five to drop him, chances are he could protect himself. Losing a creature a turn is a hard pill for an opponent to swallow, especially once it costs you no investment past the initial one mana and one card. Welkom op NederMagic! For all this talk of curve, first turn of creature threshold, and the such, I've not really mentioned Ice Age/Alliances. Even without all of these block mechanics, filtering through your deck (card drawing) for free each turn is very powerful, but combined with the nature of the block, it put the Looter way over the top. You would play a turn five Undo, and win the game. Often people lament about the good old days of Magic, where men had hairs in unimaginable places, and Black Lotus made Lotus Petal look like Jeweled Amulet. Because of this, creature combat happens a lot more often. As in, if you didn't have Capsize, you had no business playing the color. Check out other Magic: The Gathering guides and stay tuned for more at Daily Esports! Whispers of the Muse might be the definition of a perfectly balanced GOOD card drawing card. Able to deal with virtually any problem, Capsize couldn't be dealt with through conventional means (you'd usually have to kill your own creature to have a chance of fizzling Capsize). Take a look at the new and returning mechanics from the upcoming Kaldheim. Before this change, Wizard Mentor was a first pick card which could save your creatures from creature kill spells, allow you to reuse the bevy of 187 creatures in the format (Ghitu Slinger, anyone? Blue usually can’t remove a card on the battlefield, but it can counter spells to prevent them from hitting the field at all. What does a Blue mage want more than anything? Posted in Feature If you opened up your first pack of Odyssey in an OTJ draft, there's few cards you'd want to draft over Aboshan. Suddenly your opponent can't attack with him good creatures, or block with his good creatures, while you are free to send your happily into the red zone. Sure, it might not stick around more than four turns because of the cumulative upkeep, but during that time the common Forces would eagerly serve up a healthy dish of twelve to sixteen damage unopposed. Blue is the color that is primary in drawing cards. These are known as "bombs." While all colors can draw cards in some capacity, blue is the only one that can do so with no limits or drawbacks. Every format has a couple of bomb rares where *THAT CARD* is the one card they want to open. In addition, the Bouncer hit the board on turn two, and could protect himself thereafter. This material is provided "as is", with absolutely no warranty expressed or implied. Coastal Piracy more than made up for this, by allowing each and every one of your creatures to draw you cards pending successful combat. Posted in Feature It is a static ability that appears on some instant and sorcery cards. This is because you are more likely to see a specific common in any given card pool than a specific rare. Top 1 Dashboard Widget in June, 2008. Because there was so little blocking going on, and because the creatures were so aggressively costed (you won't see too many two power evasion creatures for two mana anymore much less having multiples in the common slots of each color), games tended to end on turn five. This material is provided "as is", with absolutely no warranty expressed or implied. My, it was awfully pretentious of me to not only refer to myself in first person, but to rank my writing talent ahead of the six weekly writers on this site. Blue doesn't get removal spells often, and they usually aren't in the common slot. FLASHBACK for 2 red and 4. With the power level of most cards ratcheted up sky-high, bombs flew left and right, often swinging the game like a pendulum every turn. Odyssey Block dealt heavily in the graveyard, between threshold, flashback, madness (discarding cards) and the Judgment Incarnations. When Aaron first approached me to write this article, he held one of my cats hostage. Use Capsize. This site provides accurate and independent information on more than 500.000 Magic the Gathering Decks, tournaments and magic singles prices. This card has two strikes against it: it costs triple blue to cast (just like cousin bombs Arcanis and Future Sight from this block) and blue is generally a weak color in Onslaught/Legions/Scourge. Turn = A card that lets you take extra turns. Magic: The Gathering's newest draft set is the groundbreaking Commander Legends, the first of its kind. FLASHBACK for a red and 3. In Tempest, it was turn one (Mogg Fanatics, shadow creatures, and flyers), Invasion turn two (2/2 bears for every possible color combination plus several one- and two-mana apprentices and utility creatures), and Mirage turn three. This time around I did a limited list instead of a constructed list because the constructed blue list would have been utterly boring. It speaks volumes of how deep the color blue went in Invasion Block given that this card wasn't even in the top three blue cards of the format! As its creatures are less impactful overall than those of other colors, their ability to deal damage more easily is balanced. Or can i only pay it's flashback … These games didn't tend to last long for your opponent. Blue Friends: Flashback. Lands often have no use late game in limited, so sacrificing a couple to give yourself a few extra cards never hurt, especially when the additional costs involved "tap" and not "spend mana". Each has key strengths and weaknesses that help to ensure the game’s balance. Summing up all my strength, all my action, all my prowess as a man, I swiftly ran to the computer, did hours of research, and came begging to Mr. Forsythe, sir, to let my cat go in exchange for the document before you. Both cards gave you a two creature swing on your opponent, either with you plus one and them minus one, or them minus two. Restricted in Type 1 before it was even tournament legal. What's an opponent supposed to do? In addition, Barrin could bounce multiple creature a turn if need be, clearing the path for one fatal attack. Any card which says "cast this, win the game" deserves a top-three slot on a "best of all time" checklist. Blue mages rejoiced, and white mages wept, and blue-white mages had quite the identity conflict. 100-CARD READY-TO-PLAY DECK. Flashback is a keyword ability. Drawing an average four to six cards for five mana is a backbreaker in limited, and having this in the common slot to boot didn't hurt matters much. Blue is one of the five colors of mana in Magic: The Gathering. It makes you manage your resources (six mana a turn) against drawing a card. Edit. Zvi Mowshowitz built a combo deck around it that so dominated both that it needed to be banned almost immediately after the inception of his deck. The five colors of Magic: The Gathering aren’t there simply for flavor. Islands provide blue mana, the color of the deep sea and the endless sky. While I'm not sure what that has to do with anything I'm talking about, I'm sure it would explain why none of the cards work well together. You can learn more about our database at our Google Dataset. Pyroblast is really strong against a blue deck – you get both a removal spell and a counterspell.
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