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Magic the Gathering: Duels of the Planeswalkers

A few gameplay tips


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I was playing online, and a lot of people didn't seem to know what they were doing at times. So, I thought I would list a few pointers here and there. I'll use the green creature deck as an example most of the time, but feel free to generalize as you will.

 

1) Life gain is pretty much useless. All of those cards (Wurm's Tooth, e.g.) just take up space in your deck. Getting back one life every time you cast a green spell might sound cool, but it's not going to save you in a pinch, and it wastes a space in your deck for another card. Take those losers out. There are exception (e.g. the final artifact deck has creatures which benefit from artifacts on the field), but in general, it's not worth it.

 

Another loser example is the following: I am getting pummeled. Sitting in my hand is a sorcery which gives me back 8 life. It costs 5 mana. What does playing this do for me? It delays the inevitable by a turn, maybe, but it keeps me from playing a creature that might save me.

 

2) Following up on (1), the slimmer your deck is, the better. However, there are some great unlocks you can get. E.g., the Elvish Piper will always help you - at worst, your opponent will be forced to burn removal, which is always good when it is used on a 1-1 creature. Otherwise, you are getting out big creatures for one(!) forest. That's awesome.

 

But take out losers. For example, an 8-casting cost creature might seem like a great deal, but honestly, that thing's gonna sit in your hand for 7-8 turns. By then, you've probably already won or lost (or at least the game is pretty much assured). Why not put that Troll Ascetic (one of the best cards in the deck) in there, and watch with glee as your opponents cannot shock/incinerate/terror/anything. Put on that Blanchwood Armor, and you have a force to be reckoned with, and it only took 6 mana, total!

 

3) Remember that you have two separate main phases. It's a good idea to get into the habit of playing land in your first phase, but waiting to play creatures until after your attack phase. The reason is, you will have a lot of unused mana, and your opponent will have to think about his blocks, etc. This also gives you the chance for surprises (more on that below). Again, there are exceptions (e.g., a creature that will give all of your creatures a +1/+1 counter might be one to play in the first main phase), but it makes it easy for me to make decisions when I see that my opponent has burned all of his mana.

 

4) Creature removal is the best stuff in the game. Don't waste removal on non-threats. In 8 games with people holding removal, I only saw a couple of players who really had a handle on this.

 

For example, on turn 2, I play a 2/2 Grizzly Bear. You're holding onto Terror, which destroys target nonblack, nonartifact creature. DON'T USE IT YET! I'm not going to win the game with a 2/2. Save it for when my Craw Wurm comes out, and you'll have me gnashing my teeth.

 

Another example: cards like Shock and Incinerate are far better when used to kill creatures. Obviously, if your opponent is down to 2 life, shock him and win the game. But in general, it's much better to use that shock to kill off a 2/2 creature than to deal 2 damage to me.

 

5) Following up on (4), creature advantage generally wins the game. Therefore, your goal should be to control the battlefield.

 

One of the biggest mistakes I saw was people using Giant Growth before they attack. What's the point? Now, instead of a 2/2, you have a 5/5. I'll just chump block it with my crappy 0/3 wall (if I block it at all), and you've now burned your Giant Growth. On the other hand, let's say you hold onto the Giant Growth. Now, thinking your 2/2 is not a threat, I block it with my 3/3. After blocker is declared, you pump with Giant Growth, and now I lose a worthwhile creature.

 

In fact, Giant Growth is pretty much the only chance at removal that the big creature green deck has, so don't waste it.

 

Obviously, playstyles can differ, but these 5 rules are pretty basic across the board.

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Please don't take the advice at the beginning of 1 if you want to be decent at this.. the life gain artifacts are some of the best items in the game. If you're playing a similar color to the opponent, it makes it exceedingly difficult for them to kill you. I played magic for almost 10 years and won several tournies.. in normal general play against people with REAL decks, this would be true. However with the limited decks given to people in this game. The artifacts like wurm's tooth are extremely effective. Use them if you want to be good. Slim decks are also not always better, but you do want to maintain a ratio of about 2 spells per land. If you get away from that ratio, you want to edit your deck to get back to it.

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Please don't take the advice at the beginning of 1 if you want to be decent at this.. the life gain artifacts are some of the best items in the game. If you're playing a similar color to the opponent, it makes it exceedingly difficult for them to kill you. I played magic for almost 10 years and won several tournies.. in normal general play against people with REAL decks, this would be true. However with the limited decks given to people in this game. The artifacts like wurm's tooth are extremely effective. Use them if you want to be good. Slim decks are also not always better, but you do want to maintain a ratio of about 2 spells per land. If you get away from that ratio, you want to edit your deck to get back to it.

 

Well, we'll have to agree to disagree. :D

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Well, we'll have to agree to disagree. :D

 

Well I'm right, and anyone reading this should use the life gain artifacts if you want to be better at the game. I don't understand your logic. If you were playing against someone with an effective kill combo, you would be right. But these decks are pathetic. The minor, steady life gain from the artifacts is 1) free 2) activated by both you and the other players. 3) in most cases enough to keep your health up above 20 most of the game. Why would you ever remove them??? You obviously don't know as much about Magic as you think ^^

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Additionally, the artifacts will almost always draw out your opponent's shatter, naturalize, disenchant etc. so you can drop your Coat of Arms, Loxdon warhammer (the lifelink equipment with +3/+0), Blanchwood armor, or Serra's Embrace safely.

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Well I'm right, and anyone reading this should use the life gain artifacts if you want to be better at the game. I don't understand your logic. If you were playing against someone with an effective kill combo, you would be right. But these decks are pathetic. The minor, steady life gain from the artifacts is 1) free 2) activated by both you and the other players. 3) in most cases enough to keep your health up above 20 most of the game. Why would you ever remove them??? You obviously don't know as much about Magic as you think ^^

 

Neither do you.

 

1) Free? It takes up deck space as Starcrunch pointed out. With the already limited/absent customization in the game, these +1 life artifacts are waste of space and speed.

2) This is conditional on you and opponent having the same color. And if you don't play the same colors, what then? It turns into dead weight of course

3) Substitute these dead weight artifacts for any other small-mid range creature and your opponent will have to waste a removal/blocker/turn to deal with your creature because that's a REAL threat. As opposed to opponents just looking at your lame +1 life gain because its a non-threat.

4) Speaking of threats, the best defense is a good offense (or control in terms of playing blue). And life gain is neither offense or defense, its just meant as a stall.

5) Would a decent opponent really waste a disenchant/shatter/neutralize on your +1 life artifacts as opposed to keeping it and anticipating bigger threats like Blanchwood Armor? Yup, didn't think so.

 

And learn to use the edit button

Edited by yewjhin
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Do you honestly think that latent life gain is a waste of time? In a game where there are no single deck instant kill combos. In a game where opponents can throw stuff out like Platinum angel that will lock up a game until you come up with a particular card to destroy it, that you may or may not have to wait 10+ turns to draw. That may or may not be in the deck you're playing. Where you can do nothing but wait and defend yourself. You NEED TO gain life at times in order to survive. There's more to the game than throwing out as much damage as possible as quickly as possible, and then starting over if it wasn't quick enough. If you can't understand why you're wrong and I'm right then I feel seriously sorry for you. I know you wrote the guide for this game and all, but even that wasn't that good. I came up with faster methods to get half of the trophies. I'm sorry if I bruised YOUR ego posting one of them, but don't attack my ideas just because I'm better than you at this. The people who read these posts for advice are the only ones who are going to suffer. There is enough misinformation on the internet already without people like you contradicting the ones who actually know what they're talking about. Now, I'm done. Good day.

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Don't make me laugh. I'm attacking your ideas but you're not attacking Starcrunch's? You think you're the man for everything, the know all and be all. But guess what? Yeah there are people out there (and here) who know better.

 

1. There is only 1 copy of Platinum Angel in THIS entire game and only 1 deck that has it.

2. With the already limited/absent customisation, if you actually had Platinum Angel by turn 7, and I don't already have a disenchant/shatter/"insert removal", then its luck of the draw. If I had to wait 10 turns to draw, thats tough luck, but its the game.

3. Ooh wait, luck's in the REAL LIFE game too, and even that allowed you 100% customization.

4. Ooh and how much life would you have gained by turn 7 with those artifacts of yours, rather than replace it for all-situations 'removal' or 'creature' cards? That card space can be used for so much more.

 

 

Now, if you're done bragging, do us all a favor and check out. People like you, when you can't argue, you start with personal attacks and dissing people's abilities. Way to go "champ".

 

The way you try to diss the guide saying you had better methods for 50% of the trophies, when the only detailed method I posted was for 1 trophy "Tsunami of Pain", really speaks volumes about your ability to construct a valid argument and maturity.

 

I feel really sorry for you too that you can't understand these facts because you're blinded by false pride, when you really don't have any substance.

Edited by yewjhin
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just play a match or three, and you'll find out who is better.

anyway if you playing white deck with cheap spells lifegain bonus from artifacts will be great. no need to take them all 4 to play, but 1 or 2 may help in prolonged match.

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I don't mean to re-open an old wound here but my ps3 just crashed in a game where those health cards had pretty much made me invincible but unfortunately the series of moves made it ridiculously difficult for me to do any damage to the computer AI (who also had some healing spells). The ps3 has basically crashed because there are too many cards in play thanks to the green deck managing to get 23 wolves because of the amount of mana it has. My health is at 265 and the AI is at 35 so, yeah, the life cards aren't worthless.

 

I have picks of the table and my health if anyone doesn't believe me.

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I don't mean to re-open an old wound here but my ps3 just crashed in a game where those health cards had pretty much made me invincible but unfortunately the series of moves made it ridiculously difficult for me to do any damage to the computer AI (who also had some healing spells). The ps3 has basically crashed because there are too many cards in play thanks to the green deck managing to get 23 wolves because of the amount of mana it has. My health is at 265 and the AI is at 35 so, yeah, the life cards aren't worthless.

 

It sounds to me like they were pretty worthless. You got to 265 life, but you didn't win. By your own admission, you couldn't damage the AI.

 

Here's the flaw: you can't win by gaining life, and having more life than your opponent does not make you invincible. You either have to reduce your opponent to 0, or else deck him (and I hope you're not advocating stalling out each computer opponent - it would take forever).

 

Opinions apparently vary, but I'd rather have threats that actually win the game, preferably as quickly as possible. Still, I guess having pics of a game where my life total was 250+ might be cool.

Edited by starcrunch061
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