tbf sticking around for a potential timeout is a legitimate way of defeating your opponent. Nerve wracking for combo players like myself, but nonetheless legitimate
And you lose the info of where the Primeval Titan is because it could have been the thing Seeked (seek nonland). So, you no longer know if it is there (Schrodinger's Titan), and, so it's no longer revealed.
The reason that you always reveal the card when searching your library for a specific card type is so that you can verify the other person isn't cheating by grabbing something else when playing in person. You'd have to reveal the card for seeks in person, and you'd need some systematic way of grabbing a card randomly from your deck that meets the criteria
Seek doesn't really work well in paper, say I have that changeling that seeks a creature of the highest type in my deck. If i have 30 goblins how do I get one from my deck at random?
@@michaelcollins4534There have been effects similar to seek in paper magic for decades. Cards will say "Reveal cards off the top of your library until...". So there are already effects that can pick random cards from your deck with certain conditions. The only difference with seek is that it doesn't reveal anything about the deck or its order, and you don't shuffle. But this effect is extremely easy to emulate in paper magic because shuffling re-randomizes the order.
The solution when you're in this weird endgame where blue sun doesn't quite cut it (yet) and activating faerie mastermind might take too long is to simply zenith yourself. Just do it for the exact amount of cards you have in library then the zenith is the only card the mastermind will be able to draw you. So Guaranteed zenith everytime. As long as you have 5 mana remaining you should be okay.
Seek does not shuffle. It's very cute with stacking your deck :) The reason why the Primeval Titan was no longer revealed on top was because there's a chance it was the exact card found with seek, so technically the top card is random again.
honestly idk why they didn't just word seek the same as cascade. "exile cards from the top of your library until you reveal a card that satisfies the condition, put it into your hand, then put the rest on the bottom in a random order" or something similar .... actually i just now realized i was gonna say that that gives basically the same effect but it just lets you do it in paper as well so why not word it that way but i guess the way it works in digital means that your opponent doesn't know the card you seek, giving them less information seems liek they still should have done it in the paper-possible way for a card like fragment reality, since the card goes onto the battlefield. i guess it reveals what your opponent is on which could be a little useful if you can play it early in game 1 but that seems minor enough to not care about imo
Love it as a segment, just kinda wish the name was different. I don't mind it being about showing people old tricks they wouldn't see these days, but I'll be honest. A *lot* of the zoomers I play with are even more knowledgeable about the game than me, and I've been playing since the 90s. Seems a bit silly to say it's a particular cohort, when it's actually just about Arena-only players in general.
Remember Seth, you can commit one of the treasures and then use it to cast the spell, it will fizzle and go to grave without you having to commit your own things
I would love to see more "teaching Arena zoomers" content, even if it means periodically going back to cards/themes you've already touched on. Trying alternate builds or updates, or even just playing the exact same deck for another hour's worth of matches.
i really think Arena should add a way to let you skip heavily repeated action animations so loops like this can be resolved quicker. Like, you had a demonstrable loop on the 4 treasures into Faerie Mastermind, so it should have an option that just doesn't go through the actions of spending and remaking those treasures.
this is actually a fundamental problem in computer science. Its very difficult for a program to be able to accurately identify if its in an infinite loop without hard coding every condition that could potentially produce an infinite loop. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halting_problem
i think it would be a bit easier for MTG Arena to do something like, Idunno, check if a repeatable action would create the same amount of resources needed to start the action and just skip the animation for spending/creating those resources tho wouldnt it? It doesn't need to know if the loop will halt, just check if the action of the potential loopable gamestate creates a scenario in which the initial state hasn't changed so you can repeat the action whilst only having to show the non-looped actions and account for if they interrupt the loop as those specific actions resolve?@@dannyg282
@@dannyg282 would it be possible for a player to have some option to present an infinite loop to the engine and have the application (or engine or whatever) check the loop presented?
Something that would help infinite combos without invoking the halting problem would be to speed up the animation for each time that particular animation has been played in a turn, eventually just turning them off after a certain point.
Rhystic Study sits in a weird place. The “common knowledge” comes from a time where you weren’t dying to 2 2-drops in every match. However, Rhystic study is a 3 mana “do nothing”, requiring your opponent to interact. Also, it has been a very long time since most people have seen a study, so they don’t understand to pay the 1.
@@notapplicable6985 There’s a reason why it didn’t. In 1v1 with Rhystic the threats were cards like Storm Crow and Shivan Dragon. Taking an extra turn to play cards wasn’t as big a deal when the blue deck also couldn’t put a clock on you. Play to your outs- letting the Study player draw extra cards is bad, so don’t.
I think Match 3 is a very good case in point on why Rhystic Study isn't good in 1v1. Yes, Izzet Wizards is an Arena only deck, but you can say the same about almost every other formats. It might be pretty good against slower, grindy decks, but it just folds against any deck with a clock because you really can't take a turn off to play basically nothing.
@@Valdreag17 Meh. Aggro decks back then could still kill T4. Mid-Range decks all played mana dorks so they had the mana to spare and would still kill you T5. Most draw-go decks didn't even cast their win-cons. There was no need to even play around it if all that rhystic accomplished was draw you a single card before you died.
@@Valdreag17 Reminder that Necropotence was still legal in Extended when Rhystic Study released, and Lin Sivvi had just come to Standard in the previous set. So even 2+ decades back, Wizards was still printing threats that, across formats, just comically stomped all over Rhystic Study. The exact reasons why it sucks might change over time, but Rhystic Study has always been too slow for 1v1. Even a 3 mana Sphere of Resistance, full stop, might not be worth running there, and that's just a better version of Rhystic Study.
I feel like you're doing a good service to old and new MtG players with this segment, because new players get to watch and learn classic strategies unfolding before they play at local TCGs on FNM, but also seasoned veterans can also enjoy older strategies crushing opponents again. Great stuff!
Tbh something that would have likely sped up your turns when you went infinite would simply be to put as many Mastermind activations as you can afford on the stack at once, let them all resolve, then peruse your hand for useful cards, instead of the stop-go motion that leads to a spending a bunch of extra time Also pitch Commits more and use E-Power first since Memory can't get wheeled
wait, are u suggesting using full control and holding priority to save time? does that actually help? i imagine being in full control, or switching full control on and off, would lose more time than it saves
@@alaraplatt8104 Full Control On, just mash out the Mastermind triggers onto the stack, mashing autopay and thinking as little as possible, then toggle off and let all the draw resolve, Full Control won't lose you time cause you're acting on first priority anyway, so you're not sifting through timings you don't want to act on, and you turn it off when the stack is resolving so that all the treasure and draw can occur smoothly
No one will believe me, but at MagicCon Vegas, I made Seth pay the one REPEATEDLY against my oops all Teferi Commander deck… it was the wildest thing I’ve ever seen!
1:22:00 As a reminder, Fragment Reality puts the creature into play tapped, so it wouldn't be able to block. As for Rhystic Study in 1v1, apparently it sees some play in Pauper sideboards.
I don't think I've ever giggled this much through a video... basically every time Seth asks "do you want to pay..." and the answer is a resounding "NO!"
I think that Rhystic Study performed better than it actually is because people don't know how to play against it. The games where people were able too play around it it felt like the deck wasn't able to do much other than ask the question, which gave them the time they needed because you weren't threatening anything other than more cards. I wonder if adding black for Sheoldred would be good, it gives you a significant backup plan, and drastically reduces the amount of combo you have to do, it may be outside of the spirit of the deck, but I think it would make the deck much more competitive
I'd also say another contibuting factor was just the matchups were incredibly lucky. Like, after Sheoldred: The Apocalypse having been as dominant as it has and Orcish Bowmasters being good enough to get nerfed on Arena, I think this is the worst time to argue for Rhystic being good in 1v1.
It's legal in pauper, although I'm not sure how well it would do there, I feel like most decks could either pay the one or just not care about you drawing extra cards
Rhystic study and mystic remora saw some rare sideboard play years ago, but the meta has sped up significantly since then so I would be surprised to see them again
I was waiting to hear that there was 1 copy of forced fruition in the deck but I was left waiting. I guess there would be too many odds that it would be against.
My favorite meme deck I’ve ever played in standard was affectionately called “emergency centaurs” using tithe, emergency powers and rampage of the clans. Good times
I feel bad for the colorless opponent. They seemed like a new player who got into the game by just learning and playing that one deck. Either that or they knew they weren't winning so they took it as a personal challenge to see how many cards they could make you draw lol
I bought the Smothering Tithe anime art (on Arena) specifically because that art is absolutely mandatory for decks like this. Though my idea for a deck was an Abzan deck that wins through locking the opponent out of the game until they draw for the turn. On turn 53.
Helpful tip for later: archmage's charm can gain control of those flipped sagas. Their cmc is technically 0, so the third mode there can gain control of their fable or whatever random saga they're playing.
That's no longer the case, they changed the ruling with flip cards and their mana values when it came to fatal push in modern. Flip cards maintain the mana value of their front half.
1:10:50 It really is that good. Less so in Modern and Historic, because you don't care about it being a blue card for Force of Will, but if you just think of it as an MDFC, it's super good. It fixes your mana like a fetch land, it pitches to Force, and if the game drags on, I've seen games of Legacy where it's used to draw 3 (or more in Beanstalk decks) cards. Being a shuffle for Brainstorm that doesn't require you to keep up an unfetched land is also a big plus in that format.
I think I have a better "pay the 2" card. Dream Tides. (Visions). Creatures do not untap during their controller's untap step. Each nongreen creature's controller may pay an additional 2 during his or her upkeep to untap that creature.
I see Rhystic study as quite good generally, glad to see others learning. Though if it's not in a deck with control it can often feel like too little too late
This deck is something near one deck I've been playing fro several years at this point. Some cards were swapped as new ones could improve their function but... here it goes! The main function is to pile up exiled cards before reseting the hands and getting the opponent graveyard exiled with Ashiok, so their deck becomes thinner each time. There are also several win cons like: - Pinging opponent each time they draw - A massive Torment of Hailfire - Milling their deck - +2 Tezzeret with an absurd amount of treasures - x 2 Approach of the Second Sun - And of course sharks It's been a while since I have not been upgrading the deck so I am sure that there is room for improvement Deck 3 Hallowed Fountain (RNA) 251 3 Emergency Powers (RNA) 169 2 Commit /// Memory (AKR) 54 3 Ashiok, Dream Render (WAR) 228 3 Smothering Tithe (RNA) 22 2 Bloodchief's Thirst (ZNR) 94 3 Godless Shrine (RNA) 248 2 Legions to Ashes (BRO) 215 2 Cleansing Nova (M19) 9 3 Doomskar (KHM) 9 3 Glacial Fortress (XLN) 255 2 Castle Ardenvale (ELD) 238 1 Castle Vantress (ELD) 242 2 Castle Locthwain (ELD) 241 3 Isolated Chapel (DAR) 241 2 Fae of Wishes (ELD) 44 2 Sphinx's Revelation (AKR) 262 1 Shark Typhoon (IKO) 67 2 Settle the Wreckage (XLN) 34 2 Tasha's Hideous Laughter (AFR) 78 1 Hall of Storm Giants (AFR) 257 1 Sea Gate Restoration (ZNR) 76 4 Raffine's Tower (SNC) 254 2 Sheoldred, the Apocalypse (DMU) 107 2 Teferi, Temporal Pilgrim (BRO) 66 1 Bladecoil Serpent (BRO) 229 2 Underworld Dreams (THB) 121 1 Torment of Hailfire (AKR) 128 Sideboard 1 Kaya, Orzhov Usurper (RNA) 186 1 Tezzeret, Master of the Bridge (WAR) 275 1 Emergency Powers (RNA) 169 1 Approach of the Second Sun (STA) 1 1 Teferi's Ageless Insight (M21) 76 1 Oath of Teferi (DAR) 200 1 Teferi, Temporal Pilgrim (BRO) 66 In any case, I have had really good times with this kind of deck. It also works great as people do not usually knows what you are going for. Best regards!
I love that you did this video. I've been enjoying a similar deck for the past month when I became obsessed with rhystic study. Another card that's amazing in commander that I wish saw play would be as foretold. In my mind it'd pair well with proliferate (experimental augury and tezzrets gambit) so maybe using either pollen druids or ichormoon gauntlet to ramp the free spells and blue leylines so you could play creatures/planeswalkers at instant speed. But I don't have the wildcards after making my rhystic deck. I wish I had people to play commander with but I'm stuck trying to make my fav cards work in arena standard
Great video as always! I think you could've trimmed some cards to make room for Mirrormade (or Copy Enchantment, but Mirrormade is much better since it can also copy the Esper Sentinel) to be able to combo faster/more consistently by virtually having more than four copies of Smothering Tithe in the deck.
At least Seth recognizes the irony of him being the one making this video. As soon as I saw the title, I could almost hear Tomer ranting about Seth needing to pay the 1 on the most recent episode of clash.
Two cards, Saff. Sheoldred. Forced Fruition. I built a whole deck around card draw hate that forces your opponents to draw. Sheoldred and FF are basically an instant win if your opponent has fewer than 15 life. Additionally, bowmasters are fantastic in the deck.
Edit: should have kept watching; Seth acknowledged it less than a minute later. =P Why not Blue Sun's Zenith the Yorion deck for less-than-lethal just to generate a bunch of treasure before wheeling? If I'm not mistaken there's no theoretical downside to it, with the only practical downside being the triggers consuming more of the clock - which you'd argue is it worth it because if the clock is an issue, having so much more mana than the opponent means you can dig for answers if you don't already have them, and just win in a value/control sort of way.
@@MTGGoldfishAll good my man. I/we love your content for your personality, not for absolutely flawless gameplay (and it's not like you make any more mistakes than the rest of us =P ).
This is unironically a pretty decent historic control deck. It has some disruption, some card advantage, a ‘fair’ big mana plan, and a combo kill. Plenty of instant speed interaction. Lots of greedy historic matchups are about using all your mana efficiently, and breaking that ‘parity’ tends to win games pretty hard.
I think people say these effects are bad in 1v1 only because of how much more busted they are in multiplayer formats. Maybe drawing 1 or 2 cards for 1-3 mana is good, but maybe drawing 3-6 cards for the same rate makes it seem irrelevant to play in 1v1
Esper Sentinel sees Modern and fringe Legacy play, but Rhystic on it's own in 1v1... is mostly comparable to a very slow Divination, maybe? That's the problem. People aren't very good at playing around it in 1v1, but it isn't strong. But it does get better when stacked, so Esper Sentinel is the one doing the work
@22:40 pretty sure blue suns the opponents for 9 is the correct play here as it just ramps you a bunch of extra treasure for free prior to wheeling. @23:27 and again blue suns the opponent for 11 getting 33 treasure. Which would have aleviated the time constraints at the end.
If you didn't want to worry about timing out when you got the full faerie + tithe combo you could target yourself for the first blue sun's zentih leaving up some treasures and like 3-5 cards in your deck. That way when it shuffles back in you have a much better chance to draw it again in time.
For a while I’ve been playing a Smothering Tithe / Emergency Powers deck that I came up with. A few variations, but never tried the Rhystic Study / Esper Sentinel tech. My versions include red, going for a burn kill, or using Wish to find a variety of toolbox and alternate win cons. It’s been very successful, including wins against Tron resolving N. Bolas, Dragon God; Karn, The Great Creator; AND Ugin the Spirit Dragon multiple times in a game 😂 It can be a lot of fun to pilot, but sometimes it feels repetitive 😅
I got the Yusri Fortune's Flame as a commander and other day I got 5 coin flips as heads, which lets you draw 5 cards and play anything from hand for free. Got insane board, was super fun
You should add folio of fancies to this. It’s a great tool to maximize communal draw and it operates as a great finisher. I built pretty much this same deck two years ago around smothering tithe and folio. Worked great then.
I run 4 of them in my janky Tezzeret's Laser token deck. In no small part because that deck takes time to get rolling and it can do with the additional draw. It helps me get my combo pieces, it helps me get energy counters for extra turns, and it slows down Izzet decks quite nicely. Frankly I feel the same about running Decree of Silence in Simic Proliferate. Yes it's expensive to cast, but you play Simic you have ramp. And proliferate allows you to just stack on the counters. It's low key funny when your opponent realises that they are effectively never going to cast anything again, because you can put more counters on DoS than they can cast spells in a turn.
Absolutely merciless that seph doesnt even try to win with a second sun or other haymaker, but just grinds them out over 20 turns, waiting for them to either slowly die or simply concede. Truly a wicked man😱
When Rhystic Study first came out, everyone was complaining how bad it was. I collected 4 for every deck I had that had blue in it. I have a whopping 20 of them, they have always been good if you can control the field. If you get overrun, it's not good, like you saw against wizards. But In my Stasis, Tradewind and my wizard control decks it's phenomenal. Especially in Stasis. If they even want to do anything, they are generally working on limited resources anyway, and they can't pay the extra.
I think you could make the farie mastermind loop a little faster by putting on full control, and activating as many times as possible before letting the triggers resolve. Only useful if you have 20+ treasures already though.
revel is alright, but its an upkeep trigger so its hardly ever going to come in handy. bowmasters though, that'll do it for sure, i'd even include the nerfed version
The thing about study is that even if it never draws you a card, it makes your opponent’s stuff cost one more to play. That alone is good for a three mana card, even in 1v1
In match 4 game one, if I'm not mistaken, you could win by casting blue sun zenith for 27 and then drawing for free with faerie mastermind until you found it again to finish milling the op, there was no need to wheel again
I feel something people always underestimate with Rhystic Study (and similar effects) is the psychological pressure it adds to most (not all, obviously) opponents. Instead of "you *have* to pay 1 more", the fact that it's basically "you have to *choose* if you pay 1 more" adds to the cognitive load of every casting decision opponent makes. Outside of high level play, that's actually very significant. And that's doubly true in paper when you do get to ask "do you pay the one?" over and over and over. Of course, if you read it as "you have to pay 1 more" (which you often should), you completely avoid this side effect.
Oh, and maybe going down a wheel or two for some Solve The Equation could help, since once you have a crapton of treasures it can either fetch a wheel or your finisher (or a boardwipe if you think you're about to brick).
I'm a 2 month old beginner, who's been playing quite a lot of Arena. And when I got a copy of 'Rhystic Study' in paper a few weeks ago, I actually thought of it as a pretty good card, because that 1 mana pay could potentially be really disturbing. Being 1 mana short can actually be quite significant. It can slow you down 😅
I learned the power a long time ago, in a historic ranked match far far away... Shrine and STAX are the reasons I carry at least 3 Heliod's Intervention at any given time.
I know Seth doesn't like alchemy cards and thinks they don't do well in videos, but maybe if they were simply in the list instead of being the centerpiece card of the deck that would be fine.
I haven't played competitively in a long time, but I *think* the only thing holding back Rhystic Study in historic would be the potential speed of games. If you look at its potential value, in a worst case scenario your opponent is likely spending 3 mana to destroy it without you drawing any cards (if they have good 2 mana removal, like Haywire Mite (1+1) or Vanishing Verse, and pay the 1 so you don't draw off it). That's still a 3 mana card that required a 3 mana answer, so it's 'fine'. If they don't pay the one, they won the exchange by a mana, but you drew a card for that mana - so it's almost "draw 1 + discard 1" for 1 mana. There's a couple of white 1 mana removal spells that could take care of it, but off the top of my head they either have to have domain, or you're getting a creature for free off it, so there's upside to that too (in the case of Leyline Binding, it can win the exchange if they get it down for 1 - but in that case your Rhystic Study has sucked up absolutely premium removal). The obvious downside to it is that when you play it, it's 3 mana do nothing until it does (and even then, card-draw only cards don't do anything until the point that you actually need the cards they drew you into), and historic does have some pretty fast decks. This actually feels like the kind of deck that would benefit from Leyline of Anticipation - but as someone that loves LoA, it's a pretty garbage card unless you get it out for free.
Seek doesn't shuffle the deck, it just exiles cards from the top of your deck until you find a card that fits the seek, the other cards that were exiled are shuffled and put to the bottom of your deck. Hope that helps.
There are locals at our recently opened shop that teach others about paying the 1, informing them that they should always consider doing it when they can, although they're the very same people that almost never pay the 1. A new person one of our recent games funnily pointed out that the whole table was paying the 1 except for the one that was helping him that day through multiple rounds around the table. ^^"
i’ve done this so many times people concede when rhystic gets played Back in my day i played commander (EDH) when rhystic studies was printed and i remember asking people at draft if i could have their rhystic studies
I feel like the difference between now and 20 years ago regarding rhystic in 60 cards format is that decks are so efficient. Many decks are consistently double spelling on t3 or t4, whereas back in the day everybody was playing iconic bad creatures or busted spells that they always had to play on.curve... plus historic is the perfect balance of not always dying on turn 4 or 5 but still having powerful efficient decks
Seth teaching others about paying the one is like Crim teaching others about mono green ramp 😂
Or Tomer teaching you about Anime.
they do say "who can't do teaches"
maybe it's the perfect person to teach, maybe it could be a self learning experience for Seth...maybe
Petition to ask Crim to do this
Richard teaching about flashy and scarry-looking EDH decks)
Props to the Gate Player for letting you combo of instead of scooping
Probably the first time a Gate player has let someone combo of instead of insta-scooping
@@ICantThinkOfAFunnyHandlelet’s be honest he was probably hoping for the timeout win
Celebrating someone letting themselves be held hostage is kinda weird. Seek help.
@@jugularstab found the spike
tbf sticking around for a potential timeout is a legitimate way of defeating your opponent. Nerve wracking for combo players like myself, but nonetheless legitimate
The important difference between seek and search is that it doesn't shuffle your deck. Otherwise it could be a paper mechanic
And you lose the info of where the Primeval Titan is because it could have been the thing Seeked (seek nonland). So, you no longer know if it is there (Schrodinger's Titan), and, so it's no longer revealed.
Arena Zoomers teaching Seth about Seek
The reason that you always reveal the card when searching your library for a specific card type is so that you can verify the other person isn't cheating by grabbing something else when playing in person. You'd have to reveal the card for seeks in person, and you'd need some systematic way of grabbing a card randomly from your deck that meets the criteria
Seek doesn't really work well in paper, say I have that changeling that seeks a creature of the highest type in my deck. If i have 30 goblins how do I get one from my deck at random?
@@michaelcollins4534There have been effects similar to seek in paper magic for decades.
Cards will say "Reveal cards off the top of your library until...". So there are already effects that can pick random cards from your deck with certain conditions.
The only difference with seek is that it doesn't reveal anything about the deck or its order, and you don't shuffle.
But this effect is extremely easy to emulate in paper magic because shuffling re-randomizes the order.
The solution when you're in this weird endgame where blue sun doesn't quite cut it (yet) and activating faerie mastermind might take too long is to simply zenith yourself. Just do it for the exact amount of cards you have in library then the zenith is the only card the mastermind will be able to draw you. So Guaranteed zenith everytime. As long as you have 5 mana remaining you should be okay.
Seek does not shuffle. It's very cute with stacking your deck :)
The reason why the Primeval Titan was no longer revealed on top was because there's a chance it was the exact card found with seek, so technically the top card is random again.
Ahh, this makes sense
I think the only reason I figured that out is my dragon deck has that dragon bard that let's you play dragons off the top and faceless agent who seeks
honestly idk why they didn't just word seek the same as cascade. "exile cards from the top of your library until you reveal a card that satisfies the condition, put it into your hand, then put the rest on the bottom in a random order" or something similar
.... actually i just now realized
i was gonna say that that gives basically the same effect but it just lets you do it in paper as well so why not word it that way
but i guess the way it works in digital means that your opponent doesn't know the card you seek, giving them less information
seems liek they still should have done it in the paper-possible way for a card like fragment reality, since the card goes onto the battlefield. i guess it reveals what your opponent is on which could be a little useful if you can play it early in game 1 but that seems minor enough to not care about imo
😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊@@MTGGoldfish
This deck is missing some Mana Tithes and Censors. Great Video!
Oh god
arena loves to go slowly and then be like "omg why are you playing so slow"
I wish you could disable animations and save targets.
Teaching Arena Zoomers is a great new segment
Thanks!
Love it as a segment, just kinda wish the name was different. I don't mind it being about showing people old tricks they wouldn't see these days, but I'll be honest. A *lot* of the zoomers I play with are even more knowledgeable about the game than me, and I've been playing since the 90s. Seems a bit silly to say it's a particular cohort, when it's actually just about Arena-only players in general.
@@Masteryashai think its a funny name and it works really well as a grabby title
@@MasteryashaChill out zoomer
@@MTGGoldfishwe should reach arena zoomers about One With Nothing if it ever comes to Arena. Specifically why you don't use it.
Remember Seth, you can commit one of the treasures and then use it to cast the spell, it will fizzle and go to grave without you having to commit your own things
I would love to see more "teaching Arena zoomers" content, even if it means periodically going back to cards/themes you've already touched on. Trying alternate builds or updates, or even just playing the exact same deck for another hour's worth of matches.
i really think Arena should add a way to let you skip heavily repeated action animations so loops like this can be resolved quicker. Like, you had a demonstrable loop on the 4 treasures into Faerie Mastermind, so it should have an option that just doesn't go through the actions of spending and remaking those treasures.
I wish the would, decks like this would be a lot easier to play.
this is actually a fundamental problem in computer science. Its very difficult for a program to be able to accurately identify if its in an infinite loop without hard coding every condition that could potentially produce an infinite loop. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halting_problem
i think it would be a bit easier for MTG Arena to do something like, Idunno, check if a repeatable action would create the same amount of resources needed to start the action and just skip the animation for spending/creating those resources tho wouldnt it? It doesn't need to know if the loop will halt, just check if the action of the potential loopable gamestate creates a scenario in which the initial state hasn't changed so you can repeat the action whilst only having to show the non-looped actions and account for if they interrupt the loop as those specific actions resolve?@@dannyg282
@@dannyg282 would it be possible for a player to have some option to present an infinite loop to the engine and have the application (or engine or whatever) check the loop presented?
Something that would help infinite combos without invoking the halting problem would be to speed up the animation for each time that particular animation has been played in a turn, eventually just turning them off after a certain point.
"Teaching Arena Zoomers" is without a doubt my favorite thing on MTG Goldfish.
same here
Rhystic Study sits in a weird place. The “common knowledge” comes from a time where you weren’t dying to 2 2-drops in every match. However, Rhystic study is a 3 mana “do nothing”, requiring your opponent to interact. Also, it has been a very long time since most people have seen a study, so they don’t understand to pay the 1.
Rhystic study wasn't really good till commander
@@notapplicable6985 There’s a reason why it didn’t. In 1v1 with Rhystic the threats were cards like Storm Crow and Shivan Dragon. Taking an extra turn to play cards wasn’t as big a deal when the blue deck also couldn’t put a clock on you. Play to your outs- letting the Study player draw extra cards is bad, so don’t.
I think Match 3 is a very good case in point on why Rhystic Study isn't good in 1v1. Yes, Izzet Wizards is an Arena only deck, but you can say the same about almost every other formats. It might be pretty good against slower, grindy decks, but it just folds against any deck with a clock because you really can't take a turn off to play basically nothing.
@@Valdreag17 Meh. Aggro decks back then could still kill T4. Mid-Range decks all played mana dorks so they had the mana to spare and would still kill you T5. Most draw-go decks didn't even cast their win-cons. There was no need to even play around it if all that rhystic accomplished was draw you a single card before you died.
@@Valdreag17 Reminder that Necropotence was still legal in Extended when Rhystic Study released, and Lin Sivvi had just come to Standard in the previous set. So even 2+ decades back, Wizards was still printing threats that, across formats, just comically stomped all over Rhystic Study. The exact reasons why it sucks might change over time, but Rhystic Study has always been too slow for 1v1. Even a 3 mana Sphere of Resistance, full stop, might not be worth running there, and that's just a better version of Rhystic Study.
Emergency powers into smothering tithe was one of my favorite decks you played in that standard, stoked for this
I feel like you're doing a good service to old and new MtG players with this segment, because new players get to watch and learn classic strategies unfolding before they play at local TCGs on FNM, but also seasoned veterans can also enjoy older strategies crushing opponents again. Great stuff!
Tbh something that would have likely sped up your turns when you went infinite would simply be to put as many Mastermind activations as you can afford on the stack at once, let them all resolve, then peruse your hand for useful cards, instead of the stop-go motion that leads to a spending a bunch of extra time
Also pitch Commits more and use E-Power first since Memory can't get wheeled
wait, are u suggesting using full control and holding priority to save time? does that actually help? i imagine being in full control, or switching full control on and off, would lose more time than it saves
@@alaraplatt8104 Full Control On, just mash out the Mastermind triggers onto the stack, mashing autopay and thinking as little as possible, then toggle off and let all the draw resolve, Full Control won't lose you time cause you're acting on first priority anyway, so you're not sifting through timings you don't want to act on, and you turn it off when the stack is resolving so that all the treasure and draw can occur smoothly
No one will believe me, but at MagicCon Vegas, I made Seth pay the one REPEATEDLY against my oops all Teferi Commander deck… it was the wildest thing I’ve ever seen!
its true I was the one
1:22:00 As a reminder, Fragment Reality puts the creature into play tapped, so it wouldn't be able to block.
As for Rhystic Study in 1v1, apparently it sees some play in Pauper sideboards.
Also, archmage's charm can steal a creature with cmc 1 or less.
I don't think I've ever giggled this much through a video... basically every time Seth asks "do you want to pay..." and the answer is a resounding "NO!"
I think that Rhystic Study performed better than it actually is because people don't know how to play against it. The games where people were able too play around it it felt like the deck wasn't able to do much other than ask the question, which gave them the time they needed because you weren't threatening anything other than more cards. I wonder if adding black for Sheoldred would be good, it gives you a significant backup plan, and drastically reduces the amount of combo you have to do, it may be outside of the spirit of the deck, but I think it would make the deck much more competitive
I'd also say another contibuting factor was just the matchups were incredibly lucky. Like, after Sheoldred: The Apocalypse having been as dominant as it has and Orcish Bowmasters being good enough to get nerfed on Arena, I think this is the worst time to argue for Rhystic being good in 1v1.
To me Folio of Fancies is always a hidden gem of smothering combo, which works very well when there are two or more smothering tithes.
I'm an arena zoomer learning these teachings instead of submitting late work. This is more informational than all of my high school classes combined
mmph mmmmph!!
It's a shame Rhystic Study isn't legal in modern or something. I would love to play something similar to this in Paper Magic.
It's legal in pauper, although I'm not sure how well it would do there, I feel like most decks could either pay the one or just not care about you drawing extra cards
Rhystic study and mystic remora saw some rare sideboard play years ago, but the meta has sped up significantly since then so I would be surprised to see them again
That last game was well played by both parties, and was really respectful. Good sportsmanship on both sides. Well done to you both!
I was waiting to hear that there was 1 copy of forced fruition in the deck but I was left waiting. I guess there would be too many odds that it would be against.
My favorite meme deck I’ve ever played in standard was affectionately called “emergency centaurs” using tithe, emergency powers and rampage of the clans. Good times
I feel bad for the colorless opponent. They seemed like a new player who got into the game by just learning and playing that one deck. Either that or they knew they weren't winning so they took it as a personal challenge to see how many cards they could make you draw lol
Or they're a YGO player and think of it like playing through Maxx-C
Idk about you but I haven’t seen many new players spend over 30+ rare/mythic wildcards for a colorless deck and also be in platinum rank
@@ocin5006 Ya new players ain't playing a Mystic Forge combo deck
I really love this series haha
Maybe bc I started playing magic on arena and never had the opportunity to see old cards
Next on Teaching Arena Zoomers: Seth teaches about being hypocritical lol
We, from the EDH community, would like to thank you for your diligence in tutoring young magic players on the nuanced finesse of this game.
This feels like a MonoBlackMagic deck, and I love
I love you working through all of the Eldrane enchantments.
I bought the Smothering Tithe anime art (on Arena) specifically because that art is absolutely mandatory for decks like this.
Though my idea for a deck was an Abzan deck that wins through locking the opponent out of the game until they draw for the turn. On turn 53.
"Would you like to pay the 104?" is by far the cruelest thing you can say to an opponent who's tapped out.
I laughed out loud at that point. Just beautiful.
Helpful tip for later: archmage's charm can gain control of those flipped sagas. Their cmc is technically 0, so the third mode there can gain control of their fable or whatever random saga they're playing.
That's no longer the case, they changed the ruling with flip cards and their mana values when it came to fatal push in modern. Flip cards maintain the mana value of their front half.
@@TheMegaMagikarp I see. Thanks for the correction, it's really helpful not to get corrected when it counts, like at the table.
1:10:50 It really is that good. Less so in Modern and Historic, because you don't care about it being a blue card for Force of Will, but if you just think of it as an MDFC, it's super good. It fixes your mana like a fetch land, it pitches to Force, and if the game drags on, I've seen games of Legacy where it's used to draw 3 (or more in Beanstalk decks) cards. Being a shuffle for Brainstorm that doesn't require you to keep up an unfetched land is also a big plus in that format.
This was pure joy. I still remember playing the awesome Underworld Dreams + Emergency Powers deck
You even did a video of my deck a couple years ago!! Crackling Smothering Power!
as i got back into magic. i really do enjoy watching your videos while I play my games.
I think I have a better "pay the 2" card. Dream Tides. (Visions).
Creatures do not untap during their controller's untap step.
Each nongreen creature's controller may pay an additional 2 during his or her upkeep to untap that creature.
I see Rhystic study as quite good generally, glad to see others learning. Though if it's not in a deck with control it can often feel like too little too late
This deck is something near one deck I've been playing fro several years at this point. Some cards were swapped as new ones could improve their function but... here it goes!
The main function is to pile up exiled cards before reseting the hands and getting the opponent graveyard exiled with Ashiok, so their deck becomes thinner each time.
There are also several win cons like:
- Pinging opponent each time they draw
- A massive Torment of Hailfire
- Milling their deck
- +2 Tezzeret with an absurd amount of treasures
- x 2 Approach of the Second Sun
- And of course sharks
It's been a while since I have not been upgrading the deck so I am sure that there is room for improvement
Deck
3 Hallowed Fountain (RNA) 251
3 Emergency Powers (RNA) 169
2 Commit /// Memory (AKR) 54
3 Ashiok, Dream Render (WAR) 228
3 Smothering Tithe (RNA) 22
2 Bloodchief's Thirst (ZNR) 94
3 Godless Shrine (RNA) 248
2 Legions to Ashes (BRO) 215
2 Cleansing Nova (M19) 9
3 Doomskar (KHM) 9
3 Glacial Fortress (XLN) 255
2 Castle Ardenvale (ELD) 238
1 Castle Vantress (ELD) 242
2 Castle Locthwain (ELD) 241
3 Isolated Chapel (DAR) 241
2 Fae of Wishes (ELD) 44
2 Sphinx's Revelation (AKR) 262
1 Shark Typhoon (IKO) 67
2 Settle the Wreckage (XLN) 34
2 Tasha's Hideous Laughter (AFR) 78
1 Hall of Storm Giants (AFR) 257
1 Sea Gate Restoration (ZNR) 76
4 Raffine's Tower (SNC) 254
2 Sheoldred, the Apocalypse (DMU) 107
2 Teferi, Temporal Pilgrim (BRO) 66
1 Bladecoil Serpent (BRO) 229
2 Underworld Dreams (THB) 121
1 Torment of Hailfire (AKR) 128
Sideboard
1 Kaya, Orzhov Usurper (RNA) 186
1 Tezzeret, Master of the Bridge (WAR) 275
1 Emergency Powers (RNA) 169
1 Approach of the Second Sun (STA) 1
1 Teferi's Ageless Insight (M21) 76
1 Oath of Teferi (DAR) 200
1 Teferi, Temporal Pilgrim (BRO) 66
In any case, I have had really good times with this kind of deck. It also works great as people do not usually knows what you are going for.
Best regards!
Seek actually doesn't shuffle the library. I know this having played realmwalker and faceless agent.
I love that you did this video. I've been enjoying a similar deck for the past month when I became obsessed with rhystic study. Another card that's amazing in commander that I wish saw play would be as foretold. In my mind it'd pair well with proliferate (experimental augury and tezzrets gambit) so maybe using either pollen druids or ichormoon gauntlet to ramp the free spells and blue leylines so you could play creatures/planeswalkers at instant speed. But I don't have the wildcards after making my rhystic deck.
I wish I had people to play commander with but I'm stuck trying to make my fav cards work in arena standard
Great video as always! I think you could've trimmed some cards to make room for Mirrormade (or Copy Enchantment, but Mirrormade is much better since it can also copy the Esper Sentinel) to be able to combo faster/more consistently by virtually having more than four copies of Smothering Tithe in the deck.
I really Hope That when Seth Pitched this Video, Tomer groaned, Crim Laughed and Richard asked "Really".
"I wish there were voice chat" seth says as the monkey's paw curls another finger
I’m laughing SO HARD from these first two matches! I love this deck/video
Glad you liked it!
At least Seth recognizes the irony of him being the one making this video. As soon as I saw the title, I could almost hear Tomer ranting about Seth needing to pay the 1 on the most recent episode of clash.
47:05 It's so nice to let the opponent draw some cards after he let you draw so many!
The thumbnail game is getting even stronger. The art for this one was amazing xD
You know, I think this deck needs a couple of reliquary towers and maybe a couple of sea gate restorations.
Cool deck. Reminds me of an draw and exile Esper Deck with 4x Time Spiral instead of Memory and some Lobotomy just to get rid of any enemy wincons.
Two cards, Saff. Sheoldred. Forced Fruition. I built a whole deck around card draw hate that forces your opponents to draw. Sheoldred and FF are basically an instant win if your opponent has fewer than 15 life. Additionally, bowmasters are fantastic in the deck.
Ha, I've been working on something similar for a video!
I miss my black and blue pay to do stuff decks. Thanks for the amusement to see new players to learn the suffering.
Edit: should have kept watching; Seth acknowledged it less than a minute later. =P
Why not Blue Sun's Zenith the Yorion deck for less-than-lethal just to generate a bunch of treasure before wheeling? If I'm not mistaken there's no theoretical downside to it, with the only practical downside being the triggers consuming more of the clock - which you'd argue is it worth it because if the clock is an issue, having so much more mana than the opponent means you can dig for answers if you don't already have them, and just win in a value/control sort of way.
Yeah, you are correct, I just missed it until it was too late.
@@MTGGoldfishAll good my man. I/we love your content for your personality, not for absolutely flawless gameplay (and it's not like you make any more mistakes than the rest of us =P ).
Loving Seth being so giddy about azorious control :)
That looks really fun!
Well... time to spend 30 rare wildcards and 4 mythics...
This is unironically a pretty decent historic control deck. It has some disruption, some card advantage, a ‘fair’ big mana plan, and a combo kill. Plenty of instant speed interaction. Lots of greedy historic matchups are about using all your mana efficiently, and breaking that ‘parity’ tends to win games pretty hard.
6:54 seek doesn't shuffle unless the rest of the ability says to shuffle. The titan is still on top.
I think people say these effects are bad in 1v1 only because of how much more busted they are in multiplayer formats. Maybe drawing 1 or 2 cards for 1-3 mana is good, but maybe drawing 3-6 cards for the same rate makes it seem irrelevant to play in 1v1
Esper Sentinel sees Modern and fringe Legacy play, but Rhystic on it's own in 1v1... is mostly comparable to a very slow Divination, maybe?
That's the problem. People aren't very good at playing around it in 1v1, but it isn't strong. But it does get better when stacked, so Esper Sentinel is the one doing the work
@22:40 pretty sure blue suns the opponents for 9 is the correct play here as it just ramps you a bunch of extra treasure for free prior to wheeling. @23:27 and again blue suns the opponent for 11 getting 33 treasure. Which would have aleviated the time constraints at the end.
Yeah, that was a punt. Should have Blue Sun's there for sure.
If you didn't want to worry about timing out when you got the full faerie + tithe combo you could target yourself for the first blue sun's zentih leaving up some treasures and like 3-5 cards in your deck. That way when it shuffles back in you have a much better chance to draw it again in time.
Pithing needle the Maze’s End🤔 I never tired that. I love it on the One Ring😂 everyone pays for my RS😅
The game against the colourless player made me want to throw my phone out the window
For a while I’ve been playing a Smothering Tithe / Emergency Powers deck that I came up with. A few variations, but never tried the Rhystic Study / Esper Sentinel tech.
My versions include red, going for a burn kill, or using Wish to find a variety of toolbox and alternate win cons.
It’s been very successful, including wins against Tron resolving N. Bolas, Dragon God; Karn, The Great Creator; AND Ugin the Spirit Dragon multiple times in a game 😂
It can be a lot of fun to pilot, but sometimes it feels repetitive 😅
I got the Yusri Fortune's Flame as a commander and other day I got 5 coin flips as heads, which lets you draw 5 cards and play anything from hand for free. Got insane board, was super fun
You should add folio of fancies to this. It’s a great tool to maximize communal draw and it operates as a great finisher. I built pretty much this same deck two years ago around smothering tithe and folio. Worked great then.
I run 4 of them in my janky Tezzeret's Laser token deck. In no small part because that deck takes time to get rolling and it can do with the additional draw. It helps me get my combo pieces, it helps me get energy counters for extra turns, and it slows down Izzet decks quite nicely.
Frankly I feel the same about running Decree of Silence in Simic Proliferate. Yes it's expensive to cast, but you play Simic you have ramp. And proliferate allows you to just stack on the counters. It's low key funny when your opponent realises that they are effectively never going to cast anything again, because you can put more counters on DoS than they can cast spells in a turn.
This is why I play Arena on an exercise bike. When my opponent goes off on stupid combos like this then I just get some cardio in while I wait.
Absolutely merciless that seph doesnt even try to win with a second sun or other haymaker, but just grinds them out over 20 turns, waiting for them to either slowly die or simply concede. Truly a wicked man😱
For the first game.
set a stop on your opponent's turn draw step. the clock resets when their turn starts. The ability is instant speed.
When Rhystic Study first came out, everyone was complaining how bad it was. I collected 4 for every deck I had that had blue in it. I have a whopping 20 of them, they have always been good if you can control the field. If you get overrun, it's not good, like you saw against wizards. But In my Stasis, Tradewind and my wizard control decks it's phenomenal. Especially in Stasis. If they even want to do anything, they are generally working on limited resources anyway, and they can't pay the extra.
This was so satisfying to watch , Thank you for the amazing content.
I think you could make the farie mastermind loop a little faster by putting on full control, and activating as many times as possible before letting the triggers resolve. Only useful if you have 20+ treasures already though.
Wonder if Revel in Riches or Orcish as a one-of would be nice - to have some alternates to win
revel is alright, but its an upkeep trigger so its hardly ever going to come in handy. bowmasters though, that'll do it for sure, i'd even include the nerfed version
@@alaraplatt8104 I was gonna mention the color splashing being annoying for Bowmasters, but Smothering Tithe treasures solve that problem easily.
The thing about study is that even if it never draws you a card, it makes your opponent’s stuff cost one more to play. That alone is good for a three mana card, even in 1v1
I hope this results in study catching on in other formats, resulting in a price increase, resulting in it being less common in edh.
In match 4 game one, if I'm not mistaken, you could win by casting blue sun zenith for 27 and then drawing for free with faerie mastermind until you found it again to finish milling the op, there was no need to wheel again
If you're main decking smothering tithe, run investigate removal like declaration in stone
This is the most we'll ever see Seth ask players to pay the one in our lifetime.
I love that Seth is playing THIS deck 😂
I feel something people always underestimate with Rhystic Study (and similar effects) is the psychological pressure it adds to most (not all, obviously) opponents. Instead of "you *have* to pay 1 more", the fact that it's basically "you have to *choose* if you pay 1 more" adds to the cognitive load of every casting decision opponent makes. Outside of high level play, that's actually very significant. And that's doubly true in paper when you do get to ask "do you pay the one?" over and over and over.
Of course, if you read it as "you have to pay 1 more" (which you often should), you completely avoid this side effect.
Oh, and maybe going down a wheel or two for some Solve The Equation could help, since once you have a crapton of treasures it can either fetch a wheel or your finisher (or a boardwipe if you think you're about to brick).
I'm a 2 month old beginner, who's been playing quite a lot of Arena. And when I got a copy of 'Rhystic Study' in paper a few weeks ago, I actually thought of it as a pretty good card, because that 1 mana pay could potentially be really disturbing. Being 1 mana short can actually be quite significant. It can slow you down 😅
Damn, I already ran into this deck. And I thought the person was some kind of a commander junkie left alone with Arena.
Turns out its all on you Seth
I learned the power a long time ago, in a historic ranked match far far away... Shrine and STAX are the reasons I carry at least 3 Heliod's Intervention at any given time.
I'd drop a sentinel and 1 mastermind and add 2 Oracle of the Alpha's because it gives you more wheel effects that get shuffled back in.
I know Seth doesn't like alchemy cards and thinks they don't do well in videos, but maybe if they were simply in the list instead of being the centerpiece card of the deck that would be fine.
I appreciate that he opens with "Hypocritically" lol.
I haven't played competitively in a long time, but I *think* the only thing holding back Rhystic Study in historic would be the potential speed of games. If you look at its potential value, in a worst case scenario your opponent is likely spending 3 mana to destroy it without you drawing any cards (if they have good 2 mana removal, like Haywire Mite (1+1) or Vanishing Verse, and pay the 1 so you don't draw off it). That's still a 3 mana card that required a 3 mana answer, so it's 'fine'. If they don't pay the one, they won the exchange by a mana, but you drew a card for that mana - so it's almost "draw 1 + discard 1" for 1 mana.
There's a couple of white 1 mana removal spells that could take care of it, but off the top of my head they either have to have domain, or you're getting a creature for free off it, so there's upside to that too (in the case of Leyline Binding, it can win the exchange if they get it down for 1 - but in that case your Rhystic Study has sucked up absolutely premium removal).
The obvious downside to it is that when you play it, it's 3 mana do nothing until it does (and even then, card-draw only cards don't do anything until the point that you actually need the cards they drew you into), and historic does have some pretty fast decks.
This actually feels like the kind of deck that would benefit from Leyline of Anticipation - but as someone that loves LoA, it's a pretty garbage card unless you get it out for free.
That's a very interesting perspective on wizards in historic
Seth, I am extremely disappointed in you for not including mana tithe in this deck
Seek doesn't shuffle the deck, it just exiles cards from the top of your deck until you find a card that fits the seek, the other cards that were exiled are shuffled and put to the bottom of your deck. Hope that helps.
There are locals at our recently opened shop that teach others about paying the 1, informing them that they should always consider doing it when they can, although they're the very same people that almost never pay the 1.
A new person one of our recent games funnily pointed out that the whole table was paying the 1 except for the one that was helping him that day through multiple rounds around the table. ^^"
You're such a despicably evil troll, I love every second of it.
This was incredibly satisfying to watch
i’ve done this so many times people concede when rhystic gets played
Back in my day i played commander (EDH) when rhystic studies was printed and i remember asking people at draft if i could have their rhystic studies
7:00 It was at this moment that Seth's opponent realized they weren't playing against a tempo deck.
Why no Ghostly Prison/Propaganda... for aggro decks.
Also the irony of this deck is that it would lose to a Mono Deck with a bunch of 2 CMC 2/2s
I feel like the difference between now and 20 years ago regarding rhystic in 60 cards format is that decks are so efficient. Many decks are consistently double spelling on t3 or t4, whereas back in the day everybody was playing iconic bad creatures or busted spells that they always had to play on.curve... plus historic is the perfect balance of not always dying on turn 4 or 5 but still having powerful efficient decks
I want Seth to whisper “Wow, three Rhystic Studies” as an asmr video for 2 hours straight.