Subject: Sligh is dead, and other hyperbole.
Date: Wed, 4 Mar 1998 19:36:14 GMT
From: Remus Shepherd <remus@netcom.com>
Newsgroups: rec.games.trading-cards.magic.strategy

   Okay, got my box of Stronghold yesterday.  Already started throwing
some decks together...nothing methodical, just some loose theme decks to
give me a better intuitive feel for what the cards can do.

   My first thoughts?  Sligh is dead.  :)  It's a bit early to be saying
anything that strong, but almost everything in Stronghold hurts mono-red
speed weenie decks.  There are numerous life-gaining cards, some of them
*very* good.  The new walls stop Sligh dead in its tracks.  And Spikes can
be very hard for Red to kill.

   Then there's the Kor.  :)

   The Kor are just fantastic; super-banders without equal.  If any of
your creatures have protection from red, all of the Kor effectively do, too.
The Kor take red apart, chew it up, and spit it out without missing a beat.
I put together a White/Red Kor deck with Earthquakes and Mogg Maniac,
and it's just blatantly frightening.  The Kor can take global creature
damage and throw it onto a sacrificial lamb...oh, and that lamb is a
Mogg Maniac, please take 24 points of damage.  :)

   Most surprising combo with Kor?  Goblin Swine Riders.  They were *made*
for each other.  :)

   As bad as mono-Red looks now, mono-black looks better than ever.  There
are some insane discard effects out there now, and Megrim can turn discard
strategies into more than a stalling game.  Black also gets a lot of boost
from powerful cards that have nothing to do with discard.

   Best mono-black combo?  Necropotence and Mortuary.  Frightening...
it gives all of your creatures "Pay 1 life: Return this creature to your
hand", and it gives your Bottle Gnomes "Return Bottle Gnomes to hand:
Draw two cards".  There's amazing synergy in this combo.  Look for the
return of black weenie in a new configuration, Graveyard Necro.

   Green, as usual, is more subtle than the rest.  But the Mulch/Gaea's
Blessing engine looks to be very efficient.  Decks based around this
combo just won't have cards in their graveyard; their lands will be
in their hand, and everything else will be in play or in their deck.
Can't wait to try a red burn theme on top of that.  Outside of Type II,
this sort of thing turbo-charges a Land's Edge or Stormbind deck.

   The spikes rock, if you have the mana.  They can get huge, and
they can do it at instant speed, after your opponent decides not to block
them.  Best sub-theme with spikes?  Reanimation.  Forget pumping up
the ones in play...just reanimate a dead one and steal the spikes from
it.  Miraculous Recovery is best.  Wish Hell's Caretaker was still Type
II.  :)

   Can't say much about Blue.  This is because I hate the color so much,
I don't play it very often.  <:)  But it's gained a lot of defense,
in Mana Leak, Mind Games, and that annoying wall.  Portcullis is good for
Blue also, limiting the number of creatures that have to be countered.
Portcullis also works well with Phasing creatures, who do not trigger
'coming into play' effects.  I'll have to try the Phasecullis deck
when I get a few more cards...

   I said it before:  We're going to get some new deck concepts out of
Stronghold.  Better start getting ready for them...  :)

...                                                                ...
Remus Shepherd   (remus@netcom.com)