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Legality
| Format | Legality |
| 1v1 Commander | Legal |
| Alchemy | Legal |
| Archenemy | Legal |
| Arena | Legal |
| Block Constructed | Legal |
| Canadian Highlander | Legal |
| Casual | Legal |
| Commander / EDH | Legal |
| Commander: Rule 0 | Legal |
| Custom | Legal |
| Duel Commander | Legal |
| Gladiator | Legal |
| Highlander | Legal |
| Historic | Legal |
| Historic Brawl | Legal |
| Legacy | Legal |
| Leviathan | Legal |
| Limited | Legal |
| Modern | Legal |
| Modern Beyond Horizons | Legal |
| Oathbreaker | Legal |
| Pioneer | Legal |
| Planar Constructed | Legal |
| Planechase | Legal |
| Pre-release | Legal |
| Quest Magic | Legal |
| Standard | Legal |
| Standard Brawl | Legal |
| Vanguard | Legal |
| Vintage | Legal |
Painful Quandary
Enchantment
Whenever an opponent casts a spell, that player loses 5 life unless they discard a card.
Quicksilver on
The Misanthropic Guide to Knowledge
3 months ago
Would Painful Quandary add to the pain?
DemonDragonJ on Is Black Allowed to have …
4 months ago
"Punisher" effects, effects that force a player to choose between multiple equally unpelasant options, have been part of this game for many years, and are usually found in black and red, such as Browbeat, Tyrannize, Choice of Damnations, or Painful Quandary, but Mark Rosewater mentioned in these two posts that red is allowed to have "punisher" effects, but that black is not, a philosophy with which I disagree, because black has always been the color that most focuses on cruelty and malice, and there have been two cards in recent sets, Starseer Mentor and Perforating Artist, that have "punisher" effects, so I am wondering what the general opinion of other players is, on this matter.
What does everyone else say, about this subject? Do you believe that black should have "punisher" effects? I certainly am interested to hear your opinions, on this matter.
TheoryCrafter on "Valgavoth, Harrower of Souls" EDH …
4 months ago
Welcome Back to Magic. I broke my description down to the three deck types yer seeking.
Aristocrats: Take advantage of death triggers to hurt your opponent. Examples of cards are Blood Artist, Dreadhorde Butcher and Zulaport Cutthroat. Graveyard recursion cards like Disentomb, Gravedigger, Mortuary Mire and Valgavoth's Faithful should be considered.
Burn: Spells, instants and sorceries, and abilities of permanents that deal noncombat damage. Examples include, but are not limited to, Blightning, Bonfire of the Damned and Lightning Bolt. Cards you should add to any Rakdos burn deck include, but are not limited to, Pestilent Spirit, Soul-Scar Mage and Toralf, God of Fury Flip.
Punisher: A Sophie's Choice in every spell. Examples include, but are not limited to, Book Burning, Dash Hopes, Killing Wave, Painful Quandary and Vexing Devil. I would also consider any creature with the Afflict ability, especially Wildfire Eternal to be punisher cards.
As for cards that will feed into your commander's static ability, I would recommend Burning Anger, Psychosis Crawler, Scrawling Crawler and Sheoldred, the Apocalypse.
Thank you for reading me out. I hope this helps give you a baseline of what you're looking for. Happy Hunting!
seshiro_of_the_orochi on Card creation challenge
5 months ago
Dublin, Mageking of Night's Choke
Legendary Creature - Human Warlock
Menace, Flying
Creatures you control have have "Ward - Pay 5 life and discard a card".
Whenever a permanent you don't control deals damage to you, its controller sacrifices it.
2/5
Ever felt like combining Painful Quandary and better Dissipation Field into a mono-back commander? There you go.
The next challenge is available up there.
Doombeard1984 on Is my deck off putting …
7 months ago
could also use Painful Quandary, Memory Erosion, Mind's Dilation etc as possible deterents for your opponents even casting spells, but again, would say if you are struggling getting your larger costed spells out, might make this a little tricky.
Just some food for thought :)
SlangNTrees13 on
The Black Death (Maha Massacre Primer)
8 months ago
Hey Profet93 thanks for the read and comments. First, I hate to put misinformation out there so thanks for the Final Act catch, just completely missed that one as the other effects are all universal. I've updated all the descriptions that mentioned removing counters from our own permanents, thanks! Also, made the switch to the accordions cause I agree now after figuring it out, it's much easier to digest such a long primer. Thanks again :) Other deck comments, I play 90% online on Xmage, so price is not an issue in terms of cards, as also any deck I hone enough such as this one to properly build in paper I'm willing to dish out the cash for the duals, etc. usually. Along those lines, my meta online and with the few friends I do play with is very high power, not quite CEDH but strong decks. This is definitely the most commander centric voltron I have built in a long time, but that was my idea from the start. In terms of artifact removal, I do mention a few times this is one of our biggest weaknesses in the deck and although I am a player who always likes to have at least ONE option we can find to any and every threat (hence the Homeward Path) monoblack just has absolute nada for it to my knowledge and only colorless things on my radar like Introduction to Annihilation and Unstable Obelisk I feel are too many costly and have begrudgingly just accepted this weakness...Any suggestions here? Spell slinger decks we also just do not match up well against and it is one of our biggest weaknesses, but my main one big answer for this is Painful Quandary. Happy for any suggestions here as well. Thanks!
DarkKiridon on Any discard payoffs on mono …
10 months ago
There's also Dark Deal and the Waste Not on a stick for yourself creature: Bone Miser.
Megrim is the other Liliana's Caress for one more mana if you need it.
Tergrid, God of Fright Flip if you're feeling mean? :)
RiotRunner789 on
10 months ago
Couple quick suggestions,
Cut Charcoal Diamond for Mind Stone or Thought Vessel or something similiar. In mono black and your mana base, you won't be hurting for black mana but a tapped rock vrs. an untapped one can matter.
Consider Make an Example for removal. Worst case it kills only the three best creatures your opponents have on board.
Also discard outlets can force your opponents to put great creatures in the yard before you need/want to kill them. Oppression would probably be overkill bit cards like Dark Deal and Painful Quandary would work well.
