Magic: the Gathering
I've been playing Magic: the Gathering off and on since 2005. It's probably my favorite game.
In 2012 I got 6th place in the TCGPlayer Missouri State Championship tournament with a homebrew Epic Experiment combo deck.
I got an article in ChannelFireball written about it, but the deck ended up going nowhere competitively other than my showing:
Woo Brews – Unveiling the Epic Experiment
My favorite formats are Draft and Elder Dragon Highlander / Commander. I haven't really played any other formats since the 2012 State Championship. I've made probably dozens of commander decks over the years, but a few years ago started working on a project to make small number of commander decks that I was really happy with: five mono-color decks, one for each color. I want each deck to fit together as a cohesive "whole" -- where each card fits with every other card in the deck, and where playing with it feels like you're playing with something that is well-crafted and has a cohesive gameplan, with no extraneous parts.
I track wins/losses of these decks here:
One of my favorite-designed decks of all time is Owling Mine, due to how strange and unlike any other deck it is like. It was a deck so odd that it led to one of the "worst" cards ever printed -- One With Nothing -- getting played at Pro Tour Honolulu. While I can't quite replicate the deck in EDH, I can replicate much of its spirit. This deck is based around everyone drawing an absurd amount of cards. I exploit the fact that in any game that I play this deck, things are going to get a little Weird. I play a fair number of counterspells and as many free counterspells as I can. Mana is an extremely limited resource in Kami games, so my curve is low and I don't play many activated abilities that cost mana. The board state changes frequently, so I try to play as many cards with an immediate effect on the game as possible.
This deck is possibly my favorite one. It's a sort of mono-green control deck. I play 66 lands, far more than most Azusa decks. My strategy is to get out as many lands as possible. Since most of my board position is my lands, I play nearly all the board wipe that I can get my hands on. My winning strategy is to either attack with a big creature or return Mindslaver every turn. I also have an infinite combo with Argothian Elder and Maze of Ith. There are a ton of subtle interactions that I really enjoy. I play a lot of artifacts and artifact creatures to interact with Inventors' Fair, Eye of Ugin, Buried Ruin, and Sequestered Stash.
The only straight-up combo deck of the five and the many with infinite combos. I'm not a huge fan of infinite, game-ending combos, but for this deck, the only situation I get to that point is after I have an already strong board state, so ideally it doesn't feel out of nowhere or non-interactive. Unlike many Shirei decks, this one is artifact-based, and takes advantage of a number of artifact-based combos independent of the commander. The gameplan is similar to most artifact-engine based decks (which are usually blue), but takes advantage of interactions with Shirei. Fun to play, but can get extremely complex and can bore opponents with many-part artifact combos.
A newer deck, and my only creature-based aggro deck. I struggled for a long time to build a mono white deck, and it was hard to find something that I found novel and interesting. Mono white substantially limits your design space, and despite attempting several builds, no white commander interested me. White lacks card draw, so mono white can just sort of run out of resources at some point. I found a solution outside of mono white, Lurrus, which gives me deck a resiliency and long game that mono white often lacks. Other than that, this deck follows the "hatebear" theme, attacking with creatures while disrupting the opponent and limiting their actions and resources. Using Lurrus as a commander both gives the hatebear theme a new spin, and allows me to play somewhat unconventional cards that become stronger because they recur. My curve also is much lower -- most of the deck has CMC 2 or less, so it can come out with a strong board position fast.
WIP
Other Planeswalkers on Gemini
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//mothbaby.flounder.online/magic.gmi
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