Magic and Beer

Crowdsourcing Commander

2011-07-20T21:17:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone! Sorry it's been a while, but life caught up to me and took me for a ride. (Not all bad, a lot of good actually.) Anyway, I've thought up a new idea for an article. Let me know what you think.

A bit of clarity: This series of articles is not about deck lists. My intention is to inspire my readers to think about deck building fundamentals. Themes, combos, interactions, changing drawbacks into advantages, and thinking outside the box. I will not post complete deck lists, but will suggest cards and combinations. The point of that is to make my readers better Magic players and deck builders by leading them in a good direction and letting them figure out the best way for them. I also encourage them to post suggestions in the comments section detailing how they would do things different. Thank you and please enjoy the article.

Vampires are categorically dangerous. They're intelligent, immortal, powerful, and they thirst for your blood... in general anyway. I've noticed however that if you're facing down another planeswalker they are quite happy to give them the worlds most noticeable hickey instead.

Today I'm brainstorming a Commander deck lead by Anowon the Ruin Sage. I chose him because I wanted to make a powerful tribal deck with a controlling commander. (Lies. I just got back into True Blood and I wanted to make a vampire deck.) He's a reasonably powerful board controlling creature that isn't absolutely necessary to win the game, and also steers me clearly in the direction of the vampire tribe.

Since the vast majority of creatures in the deck are going to be vampires, cards that favor the vampire creature type seem like an obvious inclusion. My first thought for the deck was Blood Tribute. I love this card because it drains a huge chunk of life for 6 mana and works hand in hand with the iconic bloodsuckers. My next idea was to include as many Vampire lords as possible. (For those who aren't in on the lingo, a “Lord” is a creature that increases the power and/or toughness and/or abilities of creatures of a certain type.) Vampire Nocturnus is like a double strength Eldrazi Monument. Captivating Vampire steals your opponent’s Commander and problematic creatures. Mephidross Vampire even makes all of your creatures into better Sengir Vampires and keeps them from being sacrificed to Anowons bloodlust. (Conspiracy could also be in the deck for that purpose.) Conspiracy also makes the already amazing Patriarchs Bidding even more unfair to your opponent than usual. Though, even without Conspiracy, Patriarchs Bidding will usually bring back almost all of your creatures if you go with a tribal theme.

Though, since many vampires cost a hefty amount of mana, I decided I'd like to pack in some mana ramp in the form of Mind Stone, Guardian Idol, Coldsteel Heart, and Everflowing Chalice. Mana ramp is a valuable thing to have, as a mana artifact can help fix a land deficit or advance your mana to the point where you can play your bigger threats.

In addition to the Vampire theme I want to use universally powerful cards. Perhaps the most flexible card ever printed is Nameless Inversion. If I want to deal more damage to my opponent, Nameless Inversion. If I want to kill a creature, Nameless Inversion. If I want to make my opponents big vampire vulnerable to Anowon, Nameless Inversion. (I know that's unlikely, but I want that to happen some day and I will take a picture.) Another useful card that should be played more often is Phyrexian Arena. It does something rare in black. It draws you cards. I know that's obvious, but it's a card that mono-black decks often don't include. It's one of the best draw cards ever printed and I typically include it in almost every black deck I make. (Even decks that include blue.) Damnation is another useful spell that usually makes the cut. (Just in case you need a reset button.) Though, one of the most useful cards you can include in a black deck is Demonic tutor. Getting exactly the card you need, when you need it, is a valuable thing. (I know many players won't have a Demonic Tutor, but Diabolic Tutor or other similar tutors make a fine substitute.) Speaking of tutoring, Liliana Vess is a great card that should be in almost any 99 card deck that can run her. She tutors, she reanimates, she makes your opponent discard. Speaking of which...

I'm going to go against my normal urges to play nice with this deck. (The Vampires made me do it!) I'm going to have a discard subtheme in my version. I can understand why most won't want to have any discard in their deck, as discard spells are a cardinal sin in Commander. Though I think it feels right for a vampire to turn its enemy into a vegetable. (A delicious blood filled vegetable.) Discard also makes Sangromancer a pretty good choice for the deck. That also leads me to cards like Nyxathid and Mortivore. (Not vampires, but powerful creatures none the less that get more powerful the more my opponent discards.)

All in all, building an Anowon the Ruin Sage deck, I'd probably include these.

Blood Tribute
Vampire Nocturnus
Captivating Vampire
Bloodlord of Vaasgoth
Mephidross Vampire
Conspiracy
Patriarchs Bidding
Nameless Inversion
Phyrexian Arena
Damnation
Demonic Tutor
Liliana Vess
Hymn To Tourach
Mind Twist
Nyxathid
Mortivore
Mind Stone
Coldsteel Heart
Guardian Idol
Everflowing Chalice

Of course that's just what I think, What do you say? I challenge you to suggest other things that would work well in the deck. Good luck and good brewing!

Well, that's all I've got for today. As always you can follow me here or on Twitter. @KuromanKuro And if you like what you read then go ahead and Digg/follow me.

The most accurate title for a beer.

2011-06-03T20:44:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone, Sorry it's been a while since the last post. I'll explain later.

Remember my post detailing how Rangers Stadium could suck it? I got another chance to go back, but this time I was prepared.
(I looked it up, apparently you aren't allowed to bring in "Alcoholic Beverages" or "Aluminum cans" (Despite the fact that they sell both inside) but you're allowed to bring almost anything else.) So I brought this.

That my friends, is not a Diet A&W, that is this.

That is Trout Slayer. it's the perfect beer for a baseball game. It's easy drinking, refreshing, and complements most ballpark food. It was pretty good until... We were evacuated... for a class four tornado...Yeah we saw about three innings before we were put into the tunnel under the stadium and eventually they delayed the game to 2:00 A.M. (We left as soon as they let us get out of course.) Then I came home to this.

Yeah, we left in my friend's car and endured a tornado with no damage, but my car at home got hail damage. (All on the driver side of course.)

In other news...

Just the other night I decided to have a bottle of Broken Halo IPA. I crack it open with a bottle opener as the cap says and this happens.

(I wish I had a picture of my thumb bleeding, but it was flowing pretty fast so I had to stop it before I took a pic.) While my thumb was cut by the bottle, I must keep my journalistic integrity.

(And yes, that's the lip of the bottle still stuck in the cap.)

Appearance: 1 It has a blood red hue to it. Odd for such a seemingly non-evil beer.
Taste: 1 It tastes salty and horrible
Aroma: 1 like death
Texture: 1 Sanguineous

I must say that Broken Halo IPA is the worst beer I've ever had. Avoid it if you would like to maintain a healthy life.

Well, that's all I've got for today. As always you can follow me here or on Twitter. @KuromanKuro And if you like what you read then go ahead and Digg/follow me.

We Want Modern!

2011-05-27T13:45:00.000-07:00

Welcome back to Magic and Beer. Today, I talk about a hot topic in the Magic world right now, "Modern".

For the first time in a long time, I've gotten excited about a format other than Commander. On May 24th, Wizards announced the formats for this years Magic Online Community Cup which included the usual suspects "Standard", "Scars block draft", and a new format entitled "Modern". This new format has every non-promo card printed in magic history with the modern frame. (This includes every card printed in 8th edition and Mirrodin block on forward.) for example,

this Dark Ritual is not allowed because it was never printed as a non-promo with the modern frame.

However, this Serra Angel is allowed because it was printed with a modern frame later.

Modern is similar to the "overextended" format proposed by many players, earlier this year. (It has a card pool that never rotates, it's starting point is after the cards in the reserve list were printed.) Though it differs from overextended at it's starting point. Overextended would have started at the set Mercadian Masques which would have been problematic as it has cards like brainstorm and the above mentioned dark ritual. Both are very powerful cards which don't fit with the way Wizards wants Magic to be played now. There are several other cards in that set alone (Black Market and Counterspell come to mind) which make the case for Modern starting at 8th Edition. But my point to all this is that Modern is the best of both worlds. It starts at a time that they can reprint whatever cards they want (Unlike the original dual lands or various great cards that are in high demand but can't be reprinted.) which will make for relatively lower prices such as in extended or standard. (Just imagine if the Ravnica duals go up to twenty dollars a piece, Wizards could reprint them in a product like the upcoming commander sets and make an almost unlimited supply.) It will also never rotate, like legacy.

Because Modern is missing some key powerful cards present only in legacy, it will have many potent and varied strategies. Look at this deck list from the mothership. That's Affinity, a deck known for it's power and speed. Here's a list from Tappedout. That's an equipment deck that uses two of the best man-lands of all time and one of the greatest planeswalkers of all time to take advantage of the equipment fetching power of Stoneforge Mystic. It creates a relentless assault of creatures with protection from whatever color you're playing and gets through with advantage from Elspeth, Bitterblossom, and Confidant.

Those are just two great decks that can be played in Modern. Powerful decks from the past may also be playable again. Jund, Faeries, Caw blade, Valakut, Swans, Zoo, Prismatic Omen, Mythic, and Teachings all will be powerful, but not nearly as they were in their small cramped standard and extended environments. Though, they will most likely not compare to the deck archetypes being thought up as we speak.

As it is right now, Modern is just an experiment. If you don't want to play in the same stale Extended and Standard environments all the time, you have to support Modern in some way. Go to official Wizards forums and help tune decks or at least talk about it. Use your twitter and use #WeWantModern and talk about how much you love this idea. If you like Extended, Legacy, or Standard, don't be afraid to openly support Modern for fear of it replacing one of them. (Wizards says they are not wanting to do anything of that sort.) If you want to play Modern at FNM, Grand Prix, Pro Tour, States, Nationals, or Worlds, then you have to be vocal about how much you WANT to play it. If you want your experience with Modern to extend beyond reading play-by-plays at the Community Cup, then please be vocal about how much you want to play in this format. It will be for the good of all of us if we all just declare "We Want Modern" .

Well, that's all I've got for today. As always you can follow me here or on Twitter. @KuromanKuro And if you like what you read then go ahead and Digg/follow me.

"Russian Republic" or "The 5 Bears of the Russian Imperial"

2011-05-20T11:57:00.000-07:00

Hello everybody, today I review two great brews that belong to two categories of beer that I don't usually enjoy. India Pale Ale and Imperial Stout.

Bear Republic Racer 5 IPA
I'm not usually fond of India Pale Ales but I was told that Racer 5 has one of the best around.

Aroma: 3 It has a bright and fruity body with hints of spices and cloves.

Taste: 4 I taste a lot of different strong herbs and several bitter hops making for a very interesting flavor.

Appearance: 3 Medium height white head with a light honey body. It has very clingy lace that looks like its made of champagne bubbles that don't pop.

Texture: 2 It's smooth on the palate and it doesn't easily turn to foam in your mouth.

I enjoyed this IPA quite a bit and I'm definitely not one for IPA's. However, Bear Republic went through the effort of creating a deep layered flavor and good mouth-feel, rather than pouring a bunch of hops in a vat and making a sour beer. (Not saying everybody does that, but I get that feeling tasting some other brand IPA's.) (Note: I must say I also enjoyed Samuel Adams Latitude 48 IPA at a recent tasting, but did not taste enough to make a proper review.)

Samuel Adams Imperial Stout

Aroma: 3 I smell Dark Chocolate and strong malts.

Taste: 5 It has a very bitter start as is typical with an imperial stout, but it then transitions into a very smooth chocolatey finish and a small alcohol bite. After the first sip you notice that throughout the taste from the bitter beginning to the tongue tingling end there is a distinct taste of coffee.

Appearance: 3 Black with a layer of cocoa dust on top.

Texture: 3 It feels like low gravity and foam blankets.

Sam's Imperial stout is part of a limited series of beers called the imperial series appropriately enough. The series was created to emulate beers created in the past for royalty. The imperial stout in particular was created in England and imported into Russia at Catherine the Great's request. I've had good experiences with Old Rasputin Imperial Stout in small doses. But until I went to that beer tasting recently, I had only had that one enjoyable Imperial Stout. (I'm on a streak of good Imperial's now with the Samuel Adams and the Great Divide Chocolate Oak Aged Yeti Imperial Stout. (I, unfortunately did not sample enough (yet again) to make a proper review of that one. though I did love it.))

Well, that's all I've got for today. As always you can follow me here or on Twitter. @KuromanKuro And if you like what you read then go ahead and Digg/follow me.

Dessert Beer and Flood Baseball

2011-05-15T21:27:00.000-07:00

Hello again. I couldn't stand having "That" article at the top of my site any longer. I have a reputation to uphold. In this piece I'll be writing my thoughts on two of the most unique and delicious beers I have ever tasted. The first is (No joke) Unibroue Trois Pistole, and the second is Dogfish Head Palo Santo Marron.

Trois Pistole

Aroma: 3 It smells like champagne tastes. Sweet, fruity, with a small bite. I also detect woody herbs.

Appearance: 3 A pleasing licorice with a rice colored, laceless foam.

Taste: 5 It tastes reminiscently of several mildly sweet fruits, raisins mostly. Strong caramel and vanilla tastes as well.

Texture: 3 The foam thickens and becomes “Cloud-like”. The liquid flows smoothly and feels slightly bubbly.

Trois Pistole is an amazing substitute for a dessert wine. It will satisfy unlike any vintage you could possibly imagine in that capacity. Though don't get me wrong, it is a fine sweet fruity beer that can be enjoyed on it's own. Though don't be afraid to bring a bottle to a wine tasting and blow the roof off your friends snobby huge New Hampshire house.

Dogfish Head Palo Santo Marron

Aroma: 3 It has a very strong woody aroma. The smell of whiskey comes to mind as well if you look for it. (Makes sense, as it has 12% ABV)

Taste: 4 This “Malt Beverage” has strong tones of dark wood like a fine brandy (Also makes sense, it was aged and brewed in a handmade 10,000 gallon wooden barrel.) and teases you with a slight flavor of cherry and vanilla.

Appearance: 4 This drink has an ichor color to it (Lovecraft definition, not classical) and no head.

Texture: 3 It has an inexplicable fluffy denseness and heft to it.

Dogfish head has outdone themselves with this brew, they traveled around the world to find the best wood and came up with the Palo Santo tree from Paraguay. They brought that wood home and created Americas largest wooden brewing vessel since before prohibition. This brown ale (Marron means “Brown”) is one of the boldest, most full bodied, and tastiest drinks I've ever had. (And at 12% alcohol I think you'll enjoy it more than three Coors Lights.)

Bonus Review !!!
I had the opportunity to try Coors Light from the Ballpark in Arlington overwatching the Texas Rangers while they beat the Oakland Athletics 7-2 after a rain delay.

Like hell I'm paying six dollars for a coors light.

Well, that's all I've got for today. As always you can follow me here or on Twitter. @KuromanKuro And if you like what you read then go ahead and Digg/follow me.

That "Accessible Beer" article

2011-05-13T14:39:00.000-07:00

Hello everybody, I decided to be less pretentious today and review a more "accessible" group of beers. That's right, today I'm dropping my condescending tone, (For the most part.) and drinking brews you can find at all but the worst establishments.

Shiner 102 Double Wheat

Aroma: 2 It has a light hoppy aroma cutting in hints of wheat

Taste: 2 It has a fresh, wheaty, slightly sweet taste. It boasts “Great Drinkability” to steal a phrase from Bud Light commercials. In many ways, it reminds me of the “Big 3” brewers. (Except I'm pretty sure Spoetzl breweries require their workers to wash their hands.)

Appearance: 1 It looks like a glass of new cooking oil with a quick disappearing, Coco Beach sand-ish head.

Texture: 1 It glides like smooth clean vegetable oil. Moves quickly but with a little drag. Pretty uneventful.

Bass Pale Ale

Aroma: 2 It has a slight citrus smell but more noticeable than the citrus is the smell of yeast.

Taste: 3 Bold bitter complex hops taste. Several types of hops layered to make a complex flavor that changes over time on the palette.

Appearance: 3 The body of the beer is string instrument rosin and the head of the beer is a persistent pillow made of cream. (All figurative statements of course.) While drinking it, the bubbly lace rolls down the side like raindrops.

Texture: 3 This ale has a very smooth glide over the palette. Despite the un-clinging foam in the glass, when it turns to foam in the mouth, it sticks to every surface it touches.

I must say, Bass Pale Ale is one of the best production beers I've ever had. It has a better flavor than most beers you'll find in your local grocery store. (Guinness being an obvious exception.)

Well, that's all I've got for today. As always you can follow me here or on Twitter. @KuromanKuro And if you like what you read then go ahead and Digg/follow me.

What Can Brown Do To You?

2011-05-10T11:44:00.000-07:00

Hello again, I'm back again with another example of Commander deck building. This time I'm showing you my main Commander deck I use every week. “What Can Brown Do To You?” (Note to newer players: Artifact cards used to have brown frames similar to lands rather than the grey frame they have now.) This deck is less dependent on it's commander and less control oriented than my Endrek Sahr deck I've written about before and takes a turn toward the more combo centric route.

I created this deck because I wanted the challenge of limiting myself to colorless cards and seeing how well I could do. I decided to use an Eldrazi Monstrosity for the commander rather than the traditional Karn, Silver Golem. Because... I wanted to cast an Eldrazi repeatedly I guess. Aside from getting out an undercosted lovecraftian horror early and often I wanted to make a deck that could stand on it's own. I decided to fill the deck from top to bottom with combo cards. But first, I decided on the general.

As usual copy and paste the list here

Commander: Kozilek, Butcher of Truth
I originally wanted Emrakul, The Aeons Torn as the general for this deck, but unfortunately she was banned. In some practice runs I was running out Emrakul on turn four. It's probably best that we don't get to have access to that card. I decided Kozilek over Ulamog because while Ulamog is strong and is pretty hard to deal with I wanted to make a combo deck and card draw works very well toward that goal. (Also, There's a combo in the deck that needs a destroyable creature.)

Artifacts: 36
Everflowing Chalice
Chimeric Mass
Lotus Bloom
Mana Vault
Conjurer's Bauble
Voltaic Key
Sol Ring
Infiltration lens
Sensei's Divining Top
Skullclamp
Energy Chamber
Fellwar Stone
Mind Stone
Guardian Idol
Throne of Geth
Lightning Greaves
Howling Mine
Culling Dais
Mask of Memory
Basalt Monolith
Serum Tank
Semblance Anvil
Darksteel Ingot
Coalition Relic
Temple Bell
Icy Manipulator
Rusted Relic
Krark-Clan Ironworks
Tower of Calamities
Prototype Portal
Mirrorworks
Dreamstone Hedron
Planar Portal
Contagion Engine
Summoning Station
Darksteel Forge

You may notice there are a few unusual choices in there, I'll go ahead and explain those. There isn't a grim monolith mainly because I don't have one. Though I probably wouldn't want to use one if I did because I only have access to one voltaic key in the entire deck. Dreamstone Hedron is in there because despite it's rather high mana cost, it's a workhorse in this deck. It usually gets me a turn seven Kozilek if I didn't have any other mana acceleration. Probably the most confusing card on that list is Summoning Station. That card is part of the combo I was talking about. If I have out summoning station and Krark-Clan Ironworks I have infinite colorless mana, and can easily play any card in my deck. Let's say I cast Kozilek off of the combo. I luckily draw a Masticore. I play masticore and use his one damage ability twelve times to kill Kozilek. I then use the infinite mana engine to cast him again. (Extra two mana cost be damned!) I draw four more cards and use the Masticore to kill him again... I'm sure you've figured out that happens as many times as I like. So I keep on doing that until I draw what I want and pretty play my entire deck and make the game unwinnable for my opponents or flat out win that turn by pumping my creatures up and giving them trample, haste, and flying with Golem Artisan. The next combo is Prototype portal plus just about anything. (Though my favorite card to imprint on it is Lotus Bloom. There's nothing quite like tapping a card to make a black lotus token. ) Powerful options for the portal include Contagion engine, Steel Overseer, Lodestone Golem, and Energy Chamber. (Which works with Everflowing Chalice nicely.)

Creatures: 22
Ornithopter
Arcbound Worker
Steel Overseer
Manakin
Perilous Myr
Arcbound Stinger
Myr Retriever
Millikin
Myr Welder
Shimmer Myr
Palladium Myr
Arcbound Hybrid
Masticore
Lodestone Golem
Razormane Masticore
Golem Artisan
Karn, Silver Golem
Darksteel Juggernaut
Triskelion
Triskelavus
Myr Enforcer
Pentavus

There are also a couple of odd choices in this section as well. The Golem Artisan is in the deck for the combo I talked about above. Pentavus is there for infinite blocks. (Block enemy creature with pentavite, before damage sacrifice pentavite to put a +1/+1 counter on pentavus, then whenever it's convenient remove a counter and make another pentavite. ) The modular creatures are there to pump up other creatures in the early game and make good sacrifices to Throne of Geth. (Tap the Throne, Sacrifice a modular creature. The modular ability moves the counters to another creature. Then the Throne's ability resolves and proliferates the counters I just moved plus any other counters I want.) Lodestone Golem is there to make my opponent's day hard. (pay five for Bloodbraid Elf, cascade into Rift bolt, Oh I'm sorry. You don't have the one mana to pay for that.) You may have also noticed that I don't have a Wurmcoil Engine in the deck. I did use to have one in the list but I play in a metagame with lot's of opponents running Bribery. I got fed up with my wurm selling out to the enemy so, After being bribery'ed so many times and having my Wurmcoil taken away every time I decided to only run creatures that work just for me. (Probably the best choice for an opponent to take would be Pentavus at this point, and that just isn't exciting. ) Bribery is also the reason I'm not running Blightsteel Colossus. (I've seen that happen before, It's hilarious but I don't want it to happen to me.)

Spells: 2
All is Dust
Not of This World

(I'm glad the wonderful game of Magic feels comfortable giving us colorless spells. It's a very dangerous thing to make playable colorless spells as they can be played in almost every deck.) All is dust is in the deck to control enemy planeswalkers and overall screw my opponent's game up. I don't run any cards that say “Destroy target creature” so I feel that All is Dust is a fair card to play despite how one-sided it is. Not of This World is in the deck to surprisingly stop my opponent from out of nowhere. I've tapped out to play Kozilek and used it to stop an opponent's Terminate from killing it. (It was pretty crazy. )

Lands: 39
Temple of the False God
Darksteel Citadel
Urza's Mine
Urza's Tower
Urza's Power Plant
Urza's Factory
Bant Panorama
Esper Panorama
Grixis Panorama
Jund Panorama
Naya Panorama
Eldrazi Temple
Eye of Ugin
Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
Maze of Shadows
Terrain Generator
Reliquary Tower
Sheltered Valley
Gargoyle Castle
Gemstone Caverns
Quicksand
Winding Canyons
Dread Statuary
Springjack Pasture
Tectonic Edge
Exotic Orchard
Mishra's Factory
Desert
Glimmerpost
Mystifying Maze
Blasted Landscape
Zoetic Cavern
Stalking Stones
Blinkmoth Well
Mikokoro, Center of the Sea
Inmoth Nexus
Blinkmoth Nexus
Tower of the Magistrate
Ghost Quarter

The dilemma of building a colorless deck is that you can't use basic lands. So I did some major searching and came up with these. My only rule for lands in this deck was that they had to be able to tap for mana the turn they came out. (So no cloudpost unfortunately.) or they had to have a huge effect. (Eye of Ugin is a great example.) If I was restricting myself to colorless, I wasn't going to limit my deck further by using lands that come into play tapped. Every land in this deck generates mana the turn it enters the battlefield, aside from Eye of Ugin, though Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth fixes that. Every land in this deck has an effect that helps me in some way gain an advantage. Zoetic Cavern counts as another creature or is a cost of five mana ramp spell. Mikokoro is a howling mine at the end of my opponent's turn. Mystifying Maze slows down my opponent's alpha strikes and flat out kills problem creature tokens such as Marit Lage. The Urza lands are also great mana ramp and obviously work well with his factory which in turn works with Mishra's. You may have also noticed my only card that deals poison counters is Inkmoth Nexus. While it seems hard to believe that I could possibly ever win with Poison with that as my only infect creature, I must point out that Proliferate is a hell of a mechanic. Throne of Geth and Contagion Engine work hard and fast to not only increase the power of my cards, but to kill my opponent. Also with Mirrorworks or Prototype portal I'll be making more and more Engines and Thrones.

Generally, the point of this deck is to assemble one or more of the many combos available to win. (You probably noticed that there are many combos possible in the deck that I didn't mention. (Or maybe haven't even noticed myself!) Feel free to comment below with any I didn't talk about.) Of course there is the alternate win condition of cast Kozilek as fast as possible and win. (I've gotten him out on turn two before.) That's a solid plan too. I think I get eighty percent of my wins with combos, about ten percent with straight up regular battle and at least ten percent with Kozilek related scoops. Overall this is a fun and powerful deck that isn't another one of those Azami or Uril deck that you see running around everywhere. Making your deck colorless will surely catch the attention of other players and once you combo out the win or annihilate your opponent's field on turn three they will surely be impressed. (Or you'll be the big target in the next game, whatever, you can deal with it right?)

Well, that's all I've got for today. As always you can follow me here or on Twitter. @KuromanKuro And if you like what you read then go ahead and Digg/follow me.

A Man For All Saisons

2011-05-06T08:25:00.004-07:00

Hello everybody, it's good to be back. Unfortunately I don't have any stories to tell this time. All I have to report on is a couple of great drinks I had at The Libertine Bar. Going into writing this post it didn't click that I had sampled two different beers based on Saison Yeast and was making an entry exclusive to them, but here we are. First up is the fine drink Saint Arnold Farmer Brown's Ale. It's a variation on the classic Saint Arnold Farmer Brown Ale using Saison yeast.

Aroma 2: It has a woody body with a very light hint of Citrus.

Taste 3: This taste was very complicated and posed quite a challenge to me. I'd have to place it as slightly nutty and earthy.

Appearance 3: The yeast in the beer makes a beautiful dust storm in your glass.

Texture 2: This beer is not as gritty as it looks. It has a fine feeling on your tongue.

Next up is the near perfect Saison Dupont

Aroma 3: It reminded me of champagne with slight floral smells and lots of citrus.

Appearance 3: Goldenrod with a thin clingy white lace despite the thick relenting foam.

Taste 4: Very yeasty and filled with Orange.

Texture 2: It had a fine grit with bubbles which were smaller than you would notice in champagne.

Well, that's all I've got for today. As always you can follow me here or on Twitter. @KuromanKuro And if you like what you read then go ahead and Digg/follow me.

Top New Phyrexia cards for Commander

2011-05-03T21:15:00.007-07:00

Hello again. It's been a little longer than I would have liked between posts, but I have been pretty busy lately with finals going on and re-designing my site. No worries though, I'm here and I'm ready to talk about my favorite new cards from the hotly anticipated "New Phyrexia".

Karn, the Liberated
First up is the groundbreaking Planeswalker, "Karn, the Liberated". (Speaking of which, I'm going back to the libertine this week.) This card is amazing for obvious reasons. His colorless mana cost means he's going into any deck and his -3 ability means he's most likely going to see play in the the colors that are light on removal. (Especially green which is getting some awesome treats in this set.) Though there are complaints about his last ability making games go on too long, I can't wait to see it go off. I'm personally not going to interfere with it the first time somebody plays it. I just want to experience dimensional travel through cardboard. (I just got mindslavered for the first time the other day, it was an odd and cool experience. Now I'm a glutton for dying in weird ways in Magic.)

Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
This card is going to find a niche. It's two Glorious Anthem's and a one sided infest. It does something that white doesn't usually get to do. Elesh Norn will either be a finisher at the top end of a few deck's curves or it will be the commander of a couple of mono-white control and midrange decks.

Suture Priest
This card will see play in metagames that have swarms of squirrels or elves running them over.

Chancellor of the Spires
The blue chancellor is going to be played in a lot of decks that like to take advantage of their opponents deck. I play memory plunder, so I'm playing this card.

Deceiver Exarch
The Deceiver is going to be played in decks filled with control effects and combo. He'll probably take the place of pestermite in red blue decks with splinter twin. Or even better, they'll both be sleeved up to increase the odds of getting the fortunately easy to disrupt combo.

Jin-Gitaxias, Core Augur
this card is going to be the beatdown. Even if this card is laying on the corner of your playmat just before you play him, Jin is going to be a hard card to deal with. He'll usually empty at least one player's hand before he's killed, though just imagine living the dream where you get to untap with him.

Viral Drake
This card is a win condition with wings. It's a combo with a body. It will see play in artifact combo decks, it will see play in decks that don't have infect printed on any other card. I might play it I guess.

Xenograft
Have you ever wanted to play conspiracy in a deck that wasn't black? Bant decks with ally subthemes will be clamoring for this card. (Hint, Turntimber Ranger)

Life's finale
there is demand for more field sweepers in non white decks and this card fills that description plus some. Casting this card with reanimate is going to feel like casting bribery in a non-blue deck, but even without reanimate or debtors knell, this card is good enough.

Phyrexian Obliterator
This card is unfair enough as it is, but imagine facing that thing down with a mono-red deck. The obliterator is going to make for some sad moments for red and green mages.

Sheoldred, Whispering One
Sheoldred is going to be a powerful commander. I can picture decks filling up their own grave to abuse her affect, though she'll still be amazing without being built around.

Priest of Urabrask
This card is pretty good, it'll filter red in multicolor decks making for turn three ball lightnings or at the least he'll be good for a free spell. It also might be worth looking into electropotence.

Urabrask the hidden
This guy is going to create a whole new archetype in commander. The mono-red aggro control deck. He will be making fast decks faster and punish slow opponents.

Beast within
This card will be revolutionizing the way mono-green decks play. It will be in just about every deck with green. Dealing with opposing Gideon's, Jaces, Academy Ruins, and almost any card your opponent will be playing will be pretty sweet. It'll also make for some surprising blowouts.

Birthing Pod
This card is going to be a build around me piece. I want to put this in my five color morph deck and flip over a scornful egotist to get a cost of nine creature on turn five. Then there are the decks that will be happy to just trade in their old creature for the new model.

Fresh Meat
This card is going to save a lot of green decks from the Wraths and Damnations that have been blowing them out. Sometimes it will just help you deal after losing your commander and a few baloths or other 5/5 plus creatures, but if your win condition is a swarm of elves... you're one happy guy.

Melira, Sylvok Outcast
I don't anticipate Melira being a popular commander, but she will be a handy tool in green decks. Also, decks with plenty of creatures with persist will be interested in having a copy in their deck.

Noxious Revival
Regrowth effects are nice. Regrowths that cost one twentieth of your life at instant speed are better.

Triumph of the Hordes
This card is a blowout and a half. There are going to be occasions where using this with one creature will get you the win. There are of course the more common situations where you'll have more than a couple beaters out already and you'll just win anyway.

Vorinclex, Voice of Hunger
Vorinclex is a going to be a great general. I'm personally building a deck for him to command now. A gauntlet of power effect ramping into him will make for an early lockdown of your opponents mana and a ridiculous amount for you. (He'll also get in for 21 points pretty often by the way. Just sayin')

Jor Kadeen, the Prevailer
I don't think I need to say much about this card. It's pretty obvious he was made to be played as a commander. He loves swords that give protection and hammers that forge suns. Yeah, Sunforger will be pretty okay with him. This guy will be very strong, get yourself a copy and get building.

Batterskull
Another great equipment, The best part about this card aside from it's insane numbers, is it's ability to protect itself. Just imagine your hand is empty, you're opponent wraths the field and you bounce it back to your hand. Next turn you have another germ attached to your wingless angel. Batterskull is going to be one hard to deal with card.

Caged Sun
Another gauntlet of power can't hurt.

Lashwrithe
Another powerful living weapon that I can't wait to play. Just imagine how big your creature will be with Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth out there.

Myr Superion
This card should be at home in elf decks or in decks that cheat cards into play. It also works very well with Priest of Urabrask.

Omen Machine
This will go into fun stuff decks. Wild evocation, hive mind, Knowledge pool. Omen machine is going into a deck with all of them. And I'm the one putting that deck together. It'll be fun I swear... Okay, it'll probably just be confusing but whatever, I'm building it.

Surge Node
This will be going into artifact combo decks. It works pretty well with Everflowing Chalice, (My favorite card obviously.) Culling Dais, or anything with charge counters.

Sword of War and Peace
I shouldn't even have to say why this card is great. It makes creatures almost untouchable by the best removal spells, lets you hit your opponent and kill their planeswalker. (No more having to chose one over the other.) Though Godo, Bandit Warlord will like this card the best of course.

Torpor Orb
This gets my award for Griefer card of the set. It's going to mess up a lot of decks whose only artifact removal are creatures like acidic slime or indrik stomphowler. It'll also mess up your deck in general. Go look at your deck and count the cards that say when a creature enters the battlefield... Yeah, it's a lot I know. Pack some spells that destroy permanents or artifacts and you should be fine.

Unwinding Clock
I'm a combo player and I have a Kozilek, Butcher of truth deck that would love to have this card. It's like seedborn muse that I'm actually allowed to play. I'm pretty sure I'll be hated out of the game because of this card, but I don't care. My horde of machines will be ready to combo out the victory that much faster.

Well that's all I have to say about that. This set is filled to the brim with fun and powerful cards at all rarities and is going to have a huge effect on all formats especially Commander. This set has a whopping seven(!) legendary creature that have awesome effects that demand to be built around and dozens of cards that will capture players attention and surely bring more than a few smiles. If you're anything like me, you surely can't wait for the pre-release of New Phyrexia.

As always you can follow me here or on Twitter. @KuromanKuro And if you like what you read then go ahead and Digg/follow me.

White Scotsman

2011-04-28T12:32:00.003-07:00

I had the privilege on Saturday the 23rd of April to be present at the filming of a music video for the fine local band Ishi. They're a rock outfit, complete with absurdities such as top hats, rhinestone eyebrows, and glitter. The affair took place at the more understated Scot half of the English/Scottish pub "Crown and Harp". I walked in wanting to try a White Russian for the first time, though the bartender told me they had run out of cream and one of the band members had made off with their last bottle of Kahlua.
Only slightly disparaged, I decided to sample a few reportedly more than fine brews that had previously eluded me on more than one occasion. I began my tasting with UFO White.

Aroma 3:
It was hard to place the smell of it at first since the aroma reminded me of something I hadn't had since my childhood. It took several minutes before I could realize that it smelled like a can of fruit cocktail with that overly sweet syrup. It was a pleasant surprise actually.

Taste 3:
The flavor was something completely unexpected, I was expecting to taste pear and cherry upon my first sip, but to my alarm it tasted somewhat like a glass of cold skim milk and coconut mixed with a minuscule amount of water. (I know that sounds bad but it is truly enjoyable in this situation. )

Appearance 2:
A medium yellow with eggshell foam and a moderate amount of lacing

Texture 4:
Upon first touching my tongue I feel the sensation of licking the outside of an orange, then it slowly changes to an angelically light foam.

Shortly after the camera crew believed they had trained us well enough to step out of their way when they bumped into our backs, I pondered on what to drink next. I asked the bartender what was the best draft they had and he replied, "Chimay White Label". I was interested to hear that, as I have on several occasion noticed Chimay in my preferred beer purchasing establishment and not tried it due to the packaging not interesting me as well as others on the shelf have.

Seriously, what beats that?

I made the decision to have a glass and I was not disappointed.

Aroma 2:
I first noticed a slightly woody bitter smell and then a bite of alcohol (I know beer has alcohol, it's just odd that it would smell strongly of it, like a hard liquor.)

Taste 3:
Crisp hoppy bliss. It tasted like several types of hops battling for supremacy, the war seemed to go on without a loser.

Appearance 4:
A beautiful amber caramel color with thin almost non-existent lace

Texture 3:
It glided over my tongue with no friction, as if I was drinking teflon. I like the feel of bubbles and grit, but it was different and interesting.

Overall it was a fun afternoon. (Filming started about one in the afternoon.) The music was great and I'm glad I could support a deserving local band all while enjoying a few great drinks. I'll update and link to the video whenever it comes out.

*BONUS REVIEW*

Wait, that's a screwdriver!
Drunkenness :1/5
It would probably take four to five of these to get me loaded

No burn : 9/10
This drink exceeded my expectations for not making me regret drinking it.

Final : Not my type of drink, I don't drink to get drunk. I also drink things for the experience of their flavor, not to fool myself into thinking I'm having breakfast. Though, who am I to turn down a free drink?

Well, that's all I've got for today. As always you can follow me here or on Twitter. @KuromanKuro And if you like what you read then go ahead and Digg/follow me.

The Baseline

2011-04-22T11:58:00.003-07:00

Good (Insert general time of day here) reader! I'm glad you came here to get your fill on (Choose one or more: Objective beer opinions / Various Magic the gathering subjects). This post shall serve several purposes. The first of which is to introduce you to my writing style. (Hopefully you can tolerate my dwelling in the parentheses.) This article shall also establish the grading system and basis for all my reviews, but more on that later. If you find my style a little much for you, I recommend you read the work of the esteemed writer and creator of the MtG format "Commander", Sheldon Menery here. (Though he chooses to drink wine if that has any bearing on your choice.)
I believe that Mr. Menery and I have similar philosophies for magic deckbuilding. We both seem to be alumni of the school of "Fun over victory... but winning would be nice too though." for gifted youngsters. (Note: all deckbuilding references in this article will be related to the Commander format. For the basics on Commander go here.) The typical commander deck should be fun to play. Though a fun deck filled with fun cards is prone to being curbstomped by that jerk playing a "zur, the enchanter" deck. So you should also build a deck that can hold it's own. (If you want to win that is, I know plenty of people that make "party" decks that just throw the game into chaos and win in their own fun way. ) Or you could take it in a completely different direction and build a deck that is filled with powerful effects and disruption made to make your opponents day miserable. (The polite name for that type of player is "Griefer") I try to reside somewhere between those three ends of the triangle, albeit furthest away from "Griefer". Below you shall find the decklist for my first commander deck I ever built.

copy and paste the list here

Commander:
Endrek Sahr, Master Breeder

Creatures:
Carrion Feeder
Thoughtpicker witch
Viscera Seer
Bloodghast
Bloodthrone Vampire
nezumi bone-reader
Pit keeper
Dross harvester
fleshbag marauder
nantuko husk
phyrexian ghoul
phyrexian rager
vampire aristocrat
Body Snatcher
Braids, Cabal Minion
Gravedigger
Hell's Caretaker
Scavenger Drake
Skinrender
Solemn Simulacrum
viscera dragger
Corpse Connoisseur
malakir bloodwitch
phyrexian plaguelord
plague dogs
sadistic hypnotist
woebearer
woebringer demon
ascendant evincar
geth, lord of the vault
phyrexian gargantua
tar fiend
butcher of Malakir
Avatar of Woe
Myojin of night's reach

Spells:
Dark Ritual
songs of the damned
Animate dead
Cabal Ritual
Chainer's edict
demonic tutor
sign in blood
soul exchange
stitch together
urborg justice
buried alive
victimize
Dread return
reprocess
promise of power
decree of pain

Enchantments:
Quest for the gravelord
contamination
phyrexian arena
grave pact
black market
null profusion

Artifacts:
Skullclamp
carnage altar
lightning greaves
ashnod's altar
eldrazi monument

planeswalkers:
Liliana Vess
Sorin Markov

Lands:
26 swamp
jund panorama
grixis panorama
evolving wilds
terramorphic expanse
verdant catacombs
marsh flats
phyrexian tower
cabal coffers

(Unfortunately I don't have the rights to pictures for all these cards, but go here and copy paste that list into that large box in the middle and click "Show lowest prices only" and "Exclude basic lands" that will take you to a page with the entire deck list for your viewing pleasure.)

I created this deck shortly after starting to play magic. I hadn't grasped all of the advanced concepts at the time, but I did know the style of cards I liked to play with. At the time I apparently thought myself a necromancer and a master of mindless undead creatures. (Totally not the same thing.) So I gravitated toward the dark, selfish, morally inadequate, Stalin-esque, Endrek Sahr. I just had to play with him, he was my favorite color, had an ability that demanded to be taken advantage of, and was "Flavorful". That card tells a story and that story is one of a man who creates an army of mindless beasts to serve him, and in his arrogance is devoured by them.

Obviously the idea of the deck is to take advantage of Endrek Sahr's ability and bend it to my will. (Whoops, a bit of my black-mage showed there.) So I filled the deck with cards that work with his ability to make small dispensable creatures at little cost, though, because of his ability that kills himself, I also had to balance that with effects that would allow me to manage the growing army of thrulls I was creating. The best way to keep the army small enough to keep Endrek alive was to make a large portion of the deck devoted to sacrificing my own creatures. (Did I mention that black is the color associated most closely to evil?) Knowing that I needed to sacrifice creatures to make the deck work, I was steered toward cards that require a sacrifice to work. (Something that is normally a disadvantage. (By the way, don't discount cards that seem like they have too much of a drawback, a good deckbuilder can make it a positive... usually.))

There are a few interesting choices in there that I'm surprised I made at the time. The deck is rather well designed in that there are so many things that mesh together to add up to something greater than the sum of the two. To avoid sounding too much like John Lennon I'll sum it up this way. If you look at that list you'll see some things that "Interact well". For example, there is the card "Soul exchange". That card is not only useful, it also works better in this deck because Mr. Sahr makes thrulls. That can be simplified into one beautiful word, Synergy. (That will be the extent of my Bill Lumberg impersonation for this article.) Many of the other cards in the deck work in a similar way. Tar Fiend for example enters the battlefield after Endrek Makes the tokens and is able to gobble them up himself to make my opponent discard a whopping six cards and he comes in as a fat 16/16. Format staple "Skull Clamp" also works well with the 1/1 bodies generated by big daddy Sahr. While a deck filled with fun cards is, well, fun. Aside from synergy, it also helps to have powerful cards in your deck. Like I said before, If you are just playing a stack of fun cards, you're going to most likely get your narrow necromancer butt whupped. Probably the most powerful card in my deck is "Grave Pact". I'll give you a minute... Good, I know. If you're behind, that card will dig you out of hole quick. Although, on a non-parenthetical side note, you may have noticed that it works well with the sacrifice theme to control your opponents side of the table while you're ahead also. All of this is a longwinded way of saying this is a deck that is decent at everything. It is fun to play, fairly powerful, and can make my opponent cry. (All things that everyone, at least secretly wants to do.) That brings me to my next point. Beer. (Did that bring me to beer actually?)

I'm going to review my first brew. This is a monumental occasion really. This will be my beginning, my genesis. My first beer is...

Yeah... we can only go up from here. Pabst Blue Ribbon. This beer is the opiate of the masses. The water of the blue collar. The choice of swerve for hipsters. I would say PBR is the definition of mediocrity except I don't feel like being generous today. It has a very soda-like taste. The carbonation overpowers any flavor it may have, though I can't taste much except a very sterile tasting hopiness. I'm normally one for a hoppy beer, but it didn't really seem to do much except make the beer taste bitter. It also has a strange sweetness to it. To sum it up, Pabst tastes like a bitter seltzer water.

Aroma 1
When I smelled this beer, I could only smell water mixed with rubbing alcohol.

Taste 1
It tasted like soda water poured through a pile of fern leaves

Appearance 1
It looked like soda water poured through a pile of fern leaves. Also, when it was first poured, it started fizzing and bubbling everywhere like an ice cold cup of Dr. Pepper. Not the most prized characteristic of most beers.

Texture 2
It was refreshing to get that much carbonation. The bubbles seemed to keep on forming after I drank it, it felt like a jacuzzi was in my mouth. I normally don't like that in a beer, but it was pleasant. (This may be skewed since I was craving a soda.)

I hope this has been an informative look at deckbuilding and that I have steered you away from a ~~weak soda~~ bad beer. If you have any comments or questions, please leave them below in the comments and I'll address them.

(Note: that picture is actually of me. I was walking back to my car from The Libertine in Dallas and I decided to pass some time in "Good Records" I walked in and there was a band playing. They were actually okay to tell the truth. So I started listening and looking around. This unshaven guy in a plaid shirt walks up to me and offers me a free beer. I accepted of course. He hands me a PBR and says he's about to go on after the current band and it'd be cool if I stayed around to listen. It was then that I looked around and saw that the other three groups of people hanging out in the store were in pockets of three and four. There were three drums at the side of the store plus about a dozen other pieces of equipment ready to be set up... The only people in the store listening to the bands playing were in bands playing. )

Well, that's all I've got for today. As always you can follow me here or on Twitter. @KuromanKuro And if you like what you read then go ahead and Digg/follow me.

And in the beginning...

2011-04-21T21:33:00.002-07:00

So this is the beginning. A new era. Probably the first time in my life I've cared to write down details of my existence... No skin off my back to tell the truth. I suppose you may be wondering why we're here? I'm here because I've had a few good brews and my friends are into tequila so they dont want to hear anymore about Rahr Winter Warmer or how bad coors light is. You're probably here because you accidentally hit "I'm feeling lucky" searching for "magic home brew". Speaking of which. I'm also going to be talking about magic the gathering. (I'm sorry in advance for all the puns.) I currently love playing commander format, and all the while i'm going through the motions with standard. (for the archives, this is shortly after gp Dallas with the 32/32 Jaces and preordains top 8) Anyway, I'm going to be talking about my passions. Beer and Magic! Decklists and drinks to follow...

Well, that's all I've got for today. As always you can follow me here or on Twitter. @KuromanKuro And if you like what you read then go ahead and Digg/follow me.