Pattern Recognition #144 - Red Filling

Features Opinion Pattern Recognition

berryjon

13 March 2020

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Hello everyone! Welcome back to Pattern Recognition! This is TappedOut.net's longest running article series. In it, I aim to bring to you each week a new article about some piece of Magic, be it a card, a mechanic, a deck, or something more fundamental or abstract. I am something of an Old Fogey and part-time Smart Ass, so I sometimes talk out my ass. Feel free to dissent or just plain old correct me! I also have a Patreon if you feel like helping out.

Before I move onto how interacts with the other colours, I just want to touch on their iconic creature types and how they represent this colour, both conceptually and in practice.

The first is Goblins.

Yeah, I know. goblins. I can hear the eyerolls from here. Also, days before any of you actually see this. But they fit.

You see, goblins are all about the now. They are intrinsically tied to the fundamental nature of in a way that Elves and can only dream of. Goblins are portrayed as hasty (yes, even with Haste itself, a la Raging Goblin), impulsive, self-destructive, self-defeating and is it any wonder that Lorwyn and Shadowmoor made their secondary colour , because it is something that they are in their own way.

Of course, as one of the old Tribes, Goblins are also on a tight leash. When they come out, it is measured and careful in how much they add to the tribe, lest those more eternal formats that have a lot more Goblins in it get something that's too much.

Like Slivers. Or Elves.

Anyway, Goblins represents 's inherent quickness, their desire to act now and damn the consequences. They live it. But on the other hand, we have Dragons.

Dragons are everything that goblins are not. From the start, with Shivan Dragon, these creatures represent the pinnacle of , the top tier of what they are capable. Huge creatures that simply get bigger. They are the payoff for making it through the crushing early game, the closer and finisher that reminds everyone that is more than being fast.

Dragons are big, dragons are huge and Dragons will always be around. They are the equivalent of 's Angels, and they are the realization that is here to stay. If they get to this point, has reached critical mass and it ready to keep rumbling. Not just Shivan Dragon, but Akoum Hellkite, which generates constant value through the Landfall trigger, Drakuseth, Maw of Flames, which rewards you for attacking again and again, or Glorybringer, or the honouray mention thanks to legitimate historical suppositions - Etali, Primal Storm.

Just because is fast, doesn't always mean that it runs out of steam faster. It just means that they get to their game-closers faster too.

But, moving on because I like to taunt you all with snippets of fully fledged ideas and I want to actually get this article done on time, it's time to see how this colour synergizes with the others.

Starting with . This Boros combination is something I approached back when I talked about and how these two colours shared their love of cheap and effective creatures. Well, that is still true, but there is also more to it now that I'm coming at this from 's side of the equation.

It is my opinion that while is the fastest colour in the game, is the slowest. Slow not in terms of being able to act, but rather the colour that is most willing to wait another turn more than any other. But when these two colours work together, these opposing philosophies are more complimentary than in opposition. gives to this combination the ability to burst into action, to go - GO - GO, while gives out a more measures approach, each side covering up for the weakness of the other.

I just wish this was more reflected in the cards themselves, as outside of Tiana, Ship's Cretaker and Feather, the Redeemed and their focus on Voltron, this colour combination focuses more on creatures and making them more and better, often to its own detriment. Why can't we get a Legendary creature - because I'm still thinking Commander, but it can apply to other formats - that gives you the option of Impulsive Drawing tied to lifegain? A combination of Dawn of Hope and Faithless Looting?

EDIT: JIMMY! You at TheCommandZone (and watch them on YouTube!) and I are thinking along the same lines here!

Too much? Maybe. That's something for Wizards to look at if they want to expand this slice of the pie.

Next up though, we have . Now, I've been a vocal opponent of the obsession of Wizards in making this colour pairing the epitome of the casting of Instants and Sorceries, and while I maintain my opposition, I feel I should at least come up with some logic to defend this choice on the part of the creators of the game, and I think I have come up with something workable.

, as I maintain, lives in the present. It ignores the past, and burns the future for the now. And I really like that phrase, I do. on the other hand is a colour that cares more for the ephemeral, for the existence that comes from the abstract of magic itself.

Neither colour actually cares all that much for the physical realities of the material.

Well, it's both more and less true than that. is a combination that sees the cards-on-board as less ends unto themselves for the most part, but rather enablers for their real strengths - casting cards. Goblin Electromancer is the conjunction point of this, and it could have just as easily been printed as rather than its actul cost for how well it slots into either colour.

For you see, these two colours are the colours of the temporary, the cards in hand are more important than the (non-mana producers) permanents on the board. You can't cast spells if you're out of mana, right? Because both of these colours share this philosophical inclination to 'fire and forget', they both find themselves in agreement that they can cast Instants and Sorceries to a degree that they might not be able to do by themselves - or any other colour could.

This is the colour combination that doesn't have to pull out just Jace's Sanctum or just Guttersnipe. These are the colours that seek to use their temporary cards as force advantage, for you see, they don't just cast them and leave them to the graveyard. It's the means, not the ends.

Then you get cards like Saheeli, Sublime Artificer, where there is a conjunction between the ephemeral and the Artifice that I know that can have. Artifacts are a problematic thing in the first place, but this is a subject I've addressed before and will again in the future.

This colour combination are the colors of Instant and Sorceries because they play to their strengths. These are the colours that get the most out of them, not just directly but indirectly. That's why Wizards is focused on that.

I don't agree, but I can at least defend the position.

On the other hand, when combined with , goes back to its other major aspect. As I said when talking about this from the other side, this combination is all about blowing stuff up, and this holds true even when looking at it through the lens of .

But I do want to point out that there is an additional aspect to this combination that is useful, especially more low to the ground and in many formats. It's a thing I've exploited even in draft.

likes to sacrifice creatures. You know what can do at the common level? Have you ever used Act of Treason to steal a creature, then sacrifice it to benefit you and deny the creature any further use by the opponent. This sort of interaction is something that neither colour can do by itself, but the idea that "What's yours is mine, and I do with what's mine that I desire" is uniquely in this combination.

Thematically, this is also the most isolationist of colours, the theme being "Don't mess with me and I won't mess with you." Of course, given that this is Magic, the messing has already begun simply by sitting down at the table. Therefore, they are obligated to mess with you right back, and this color combo is great at messing things up, either in the hands or in the boardstate of their opponents.

The last color combination is truly the last as when I get to , I will have already touched on everything before. Like , loves its creatures and shares that love with . But unlike the former, the latter shares this embrace with the larger rather than the smaller.

Go Big and Go Home.

In combination, is the opposite of in their treatment of the boardstate. It builds up, then slams down threat after threat after threat, keeping the early game locked down thanks to the removal of powered up by the mana production of .

This allied colour is all about aggression, more-so than any other combination in the game and the only question is when you go for the throat, rather than if. Even their smaller creatures, like Wild Cantor serve the purpose of helping escalate the threat involved.

If you play this, you're committing yourself to be the biggest and baddest dude at the table. Own it.

Artifacts, are a bit more complicated on their own. can barely sneeze without tripping over artifact destruction, so much so that it's usually stapled onto some other effect, much like will randomly draw a card when it casts a spell. Abrade is a Lightning Strike or a Shatter as a modal spell. It's that easy for them, and has been easy for them from the get-go.

Of course, they also on occasion, adore artifacts. Feldon of the Third Path, contemporary of Urza and Mishra. Daretti, Scrap Savant give you value for your artifacts. Bosh, Iron Golem throws them at people for damage. Maraxus of Keld (never thought you'd see this guy again, huh?) actually cares about your untapped artifacts!

has a definite love-hate relationship with artifacts of all stripes, and while it tends towards the hate side of things, there is still love under all that rough exterior. You just have to go digging.

But not everything is all perfect and rosy with . This colour has had some egregious missteps in the past. Like Wizards trying to phase out land destruction in favour of forcing lands to tap, like with Chandra's Revolution. This was an attempt to 'soften' the more hard aspect to land destruction, but the concept never really took hold. The ability to take out a land is something that has always done, and balancing out when these sorts of cards can be cast and how they affect the boardstate is a balancing act that Wizards has been loathe to touch, save to try to move it back from the third turn with Stone Rain to the fourth turn with Rubble Reading or Tectonic Rift.

Yeah, no, didn't happen. looked over at encroaching on its slice of the pie and hissed at it before sending back over to its side.

But some new things are definitely in 's favour. The prevalence of Impulse Draw is a good thing, but another think I like to see, and would like more of is the idea of the temporary token creature. Feldon of the Third Path makes copies, but Chandra, Flamecaller or Chandra, Acolyte of Flame making tokens. Or Valduk, Keeper of the Flame.

Repeatable effects that make hasty tokens for the turn. Use them, then lose them. Who cares how long they last? Is that not the question of ? Nothing is permanent, so so what you can, when you can?

is a colour at war with itself. It wants to be fast, and is fast. But it also rewards careful and patient play in threading the needle of needing to act and actually doing so. You win hard or lose hard and there's no real middle ground.

Of course, this colour, like all others, is developing as time goes on. It's not set in stone, and that's good. I look forward to seeing where this colour goes next, either in reinforcing existing aspects or in pushing into new ones.

Join me next week when I talk about math, reductionism and what I think is one of Wizard's colossal missteps in dealing with their playerbase.

So, until then, please consider donating to my Pattern Recognition Patreon. Yeah, I have a job, but more income is always better. I still have plans to do a audio Pattern Recognition at some point, or perhaps a Twitch stream. And you can bribe your way to the front of the line to have your questions, comments and observations answered!