MYOS Rock - What should the second block be?

ThanosIsKing · Joined: 13 Sep 2005 Posts: 2

So, in building a Rock deck in MYOS, we all know that one of the blocks you are forced to use is Invasion Block. It's a no-brainer. Desolation Angel, Pernicious Deed, Spiritmonger, Vindicate, Arena, the list of great cards goes on. But you can't have cards from just one block for MYOS, it's stupid. Most people have used Ravnica block as the complementing block for their MYOS Rock decks. And it makes sense - Angel of Despair, Hierarch, the Shocklands...but I've been thinking: is it possible to use the Lorwyn "megablock" instead of the Ravnica block as the block that complements Invasion block? Sure, you lose a lot of mana consistency without the Shocklands, but I believe that Lorwyn/Shadowmoor block offers a lot of great goodies in the exchange. With Lorwyn, you get Thoughtseize, which gives you Thoughtseize and allows you to explore base sets that aren't 7th Edition (since it's on par with Duress), Shriekmaw as creature control, Oblivion Ring, Garruk, Doran...

Now, this is just a concept at this point; I don't have any ideas on a decklist at the moment. I just wanted to get some impressions about the possibility. So, what do you think?

curly · Joined: 20 Nov 2007 Posts: 60

well read eladrials articals, learn the formate then build the deck. stop trying to get other peopel to do shit for you.

theMamba · Joined: 26 Jun 2008 Posts: 28

why so harsh? he's just asking an opinion. jeez

Streakz · Joined: 13 Oct 2005 Posts: 109

Is this curly guy real? First of all, and with no disrespect to Eladriel I'm very happy with what he's done to expand the format, he's not one of the greatest deck builders (not a bad one either) so even if he had a rock list in there it wouldn't necessarily be the end all be all of what to play. Secondly, reading an article and simply looking at a deck list isn't going to help you make very many actual deck building decisions.

As to your question Thanos, I think it would probably be better to stick with Ravnica because you also get the bouncelands which you didn't mention but are extremely important to any deck that can afford to play them. You get plenty of good cards between IPA and RGD that its not worth greatly hurting the manabase in order to improve your card quality slightly at best.

KeySam · Joined: 14 Oct 2005 Posts: 545

I think its very posible to go with Lor block. The mana fixing shouldnt realy be a problem with filter land and tribal lands and any others you get. Kitchen finks is a kind of hierarch and Doran is a realy good creature. Like mentioned before seize is good, but you also get Bitterblossom if you want to have it. I think it realy depends how you want your deck to look like exactly.

Eldariel · Joined: 15 Jun 2006 Posts: 203

GBW Rock around Lor and Invasion definitely makes sense. In fact, it's probably far stronger than the Ravnica/Lorwyn Doran-builds people are presently playing (although that deck's problem is more in that it's built in a suboptimal manner than the actual cards, but that's besides the point).

The important thing to remember though is that Ravnica is often played because of the manabases it allows. Invasion/Lorwyn manabase would probably be far more painful, especially since you can only play so many filter lands before running into trouble with being able to use less than all your mana at once, and keeping hands with only Filters.

Anyways, if you can get the manabase sorted, the deck has promise. I've been wanting to build something along those lines myself for a while, but never got around it (it's not like there's a lack of options as to what you can build for MYOS). It would obviously start with 4 Deeds, and probably 4 Thoughtseizes too in the traditional Rock-fashion. Next would probably be Duress (7th seems like the natural core when Invasion provides the opposing-colour pains), Chameleon Colossus, Finks and probably some acceleration (likely Birds of Paradise + Llany as the landfetching cards in both blocks are rather weak; the dissynergy between Birds and Deed shouldn't be overwhelming). Then Profane Command, Vindicate, Shriek, probably Garruk and maybe Miss Vess too (probably not though). Doran would probably be a good call in some quantities if only to support Murmuring Bosk a bit, and to shrink Goblin Piledrivers.

Teeg seems like a solid sideboard option, along with Plague et al. Then there's Wheel or Macabre for gravehate and the option of playing Mutavault if the manabase can support it. Heck, there's Spiritmonger if feeling really oldschool.

Zerotlr · Joined: 23 Nov 2007 Posts: 18

LRW + INV rock seems at first like a really good recipe. Invasion has the good spells: deed, vindicate while LRW has the good critters: finks, collosus, shriekmaw along with Garruk & thoughtseize and many other options.

But there's a key ingredient that both blocks lack and sadly, all core sets also lack (wich i hope will be fixed in 11th) and that's good mana acceleration/fixing other that elves and birds. With those sets your options are limited to birds, druid, fertile ground all of wich are anti-sinergistic with deed and more important, fail in the aggro matchup where you need them the most. And without bread, there no sandwich.

For Rock you want good anti aggro mana accel like wall of roots, sakura tribe elder, search for tomorrow, edge of autumn, etc. I wish they printed something like farseek in all core sets.

If you find a way around this problem, i'd stay away from spiritmonger and desolation angel as they're plain bad in myos and inferior to LRW critters.

Eldariel · Joined: 15 Jun 2006 Posts: 203

Well, there's always Rampant Growth-type effects (pretty much Farseek with slightly less versatility), and anything that fetches a Forest to find Murmuring Bosk. But yea, Deed and Finks should help in the aggro MU. They don't get there alone, but they're a good starting point.

Cheaper removal could be the solution. But yea, the given sets are filled with cards that tutor lands to hand, so those are no issue. Land into play for a reasonable cost is pretty much limited to Growth though.