Silence

Instant

Your opponents can't cast spells this turn. (Spells cast before this resolves are unaffected.)

Discussion (45)

AstroAA on [EDH][Primer] Adeline Anthem Beatdown

1 week ago

Hello IHATENAMES! Thank you for your comments!

Personally, while I think Adeline lends herself to work well with equipment, I don't want that to be the focus of the deck - I'd like the deck to focus more on powering up the tokens through anthem effects. Most of the equipment that is there is because it's able to offer things towards our gameplan (Veteran's Armaments, Stoneforge Masterwork), give some form of protection or evasion (Loxodon Warhammer, Darksteel Plate, Whispersilk Cloak), or offers an additional form of removal (Godsend, Sword of Feast and Famine, Shadowspear). Batterskull provides an additional creature, which further boosts Adeline's power.

My main problem with mass removal in a deck like this is most of the time it's counterintuitive, meaning it messes with us more so than our opponents. Otherwise, I would run Wrath of God and Day of Judgment 100%. As for targeted removal, I am aware that my package is rather lacking. I'm a big fan of getting rid of things before they're even a threat or have a chance to be a threat, hence the Silence and Orim's Chant. I want to add more, but my problem is I also like utility and most of the cards that say "Destory target Artifact or Enchantment" are over-costed in my opinion.

As for the anthem effects you suggested, my main problem with them is they're over-costed for what we get. Take Honor of the Pure as an example - it's two mana for a +1/+1 effect for all of our creatures. Metallic Mimic does something very similar, as does Thalia's Lieutenant. Intangible Virtue is perhaps something that I might add, but all the others are too much mana in my opinion for what they do. My problem with cards like Gauntlet of Power is there is another mono-white deck at the table, and I'd rather not help them out.

Regardless, again, thank you for your comments!

libraryjoy on Balancing my 2 decks against …

2 weeks ago

I agree with Gavriel, except for one thing. The white deck could run a couple of Call to Glory to untap all creatures (also gives pseudo-vigilance and the element of surprise). The curve on the white deck is way too high, and there are too many counterspells in the blue deck. Repeatable token generation is definitely the way to go. Consider things like Populate, Growing Ranks, Sundering Growth. To interact with big threats from the blue deck, Oblivion Ring definitely could find a place. To give white a "sleep" effect, I like Blinding Light. And the Whelming Waves do seem especially cruel against the white deck. If you keep them in, you also need to give white a nasty edge to play. Celestial Dawn would wreck the blue deck entirely. You could also include things like Thalia, Guardian of Thraben, Conqueror's Flail, Grand Abolisher or Silence to give white a competitive edge against all the counterspells (and they're all pretty expensive, because they are so effective).

Rhys the Redeemed would be an awesome include for the white deck. You might also look for things that make bigger scarier tokens, like 4/4 angels Moonsilver Spear or Seraphic Greatsword. Or low to the ground anthems like Honor of the Pure. Plus a little card draw in there somehow. Not white's strong suit, but something like Mentor of the Meek might work.

Tzefick on Critical Banishment

4 weeks ago

I really like the idea of more colors getting access to interact with the stack and I really think White is a good color to add some additional design space. Obviously it cannot get on par with blue so it needs some additional conditions or costs associated to get this effect.

I think this is a very good example to fit that space. Nice work.

Just a side note, for the sake of reducing word count could it be written as "... costs less for each spell cast and each ability activated by your opponents this turn." ?

I get the point in being specific about only caring about your opponents' actions but I think it would be consciously misinterpretation of the above line to think it isn't specifically for your opponents' actions.

Why is white a good fit? (wall of text) Show

First of all it seems like counter magic is a vital tool to interact with combo strategies especially when considering the Commander format, and it is the reason we've seen so many "free"-to-cast counter spells especially for Commander and why they drive sales so much. However that is only accessible to Blue, so the rest of the color pie is borderline useless in attempting to interact with most combos. I mean a Silence could work to interact with some combos, but that is such a narrowly applicable card in the rest of the game that it remains a tech card with a heavy drawback. And it might just eat one of the aforementioned "free"-to-cast counter spells and there's not much redundancy available either.

There's a reason why most competitive cEDH decks are including Blue. Coincidentally a lot include Black and Green as well as the three most powerful colors in Magic - at least for single-ton formats.

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White used to have some affinity for artifacts but that seems to have been handed over to blue/red. Right now White is mostly concerned about Equipments within the artifact realm and the synergies are not that widespread nor that powerful.

White used to be the best or on par to deal with artifacts and enchantments with Disenchant and Purify and similar effects but green has mostly taken over in acquiring design space for this mechanic - Bane of Progress Broken Bond You Find a Cursed Idol. The best improvement on the mechanic that white has is Austere Command due to flexibility and Heliod's Intervention to snipe multiple without harming yourself. And that's one of the bigger differences. White leans more on Enchantments and Artifacts than Green does, so Green doesn't have much drawback in including Bane of Progress. Whereas White leans on Artifacts for mana ramp and Equipments and they lean on Enchantments for strong synergies.

White once had their card advantage through ensuring their board survives, either through protection, prevention, regeneration, then shroud to a lesser degree, then indestructible - but only on creatures. However Black has gained exile mechanics, red has "burn to a crisp" mechanics and blue Cyclonic Rift or Curse of the Swine. So indestructible as a safety measure is getting worse and worse. Not to mention they get outdone by Green - again. Only exception is the ever increasing price on Teferi's Protection but that has its drawbacks too - namely you remove yourself from the game and can't interact further - unless you somehow can cast spells without mana from permanents.

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Cards like Rebuff the Wicked or Lapse of Certainty are interesting to expand upon within the design space for white and will grant it back some strengths and uniqueness it used to have. However to be able to properly interact with the stack it cannot just be conditioned behind being the one targeted - that would equate it to hexproof/protection and also make it useless against board wipe or the infamous Cyclonic Rift one-sided board sweep.

Possibly the design space could include some "punisher" mechanics loaned from red but transformed instead of inflicting pain on the opponent, you gain a benefit - for instance:

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Inspection

Instant

Choose target spell or ability an opponent controls. That opponent may have Inspection counter the chosen spell or ability. If they don't, choose one:

• Create three 1/1 white Human Soldier tokens.
• Create two Treasures then gain 4 life.
• Search your library for up to two basic land cards and put them into your hand, then shuffle.

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The flavor being to pass the spell you have to pay the toll (chosen by the Inspector for their benefit) or be rejected.

Taxing is the most recent mechanic that white has expanded upon and embraced but that is usually done on permanents as static or triggered abilities. This means WotC have to water down these cards' immediate impact and make the mechanic less enticing in the short run, which is often when it matters the most. Drawing Thalia, Guardian of Thraben on turn 5+ is often not that impactful, whereas on turn 2 you can cripple some decks. It would be refreshing if WotC would expand on the mechanic for ETBs or instant/sorceries with a here-and-now benefit rather than dragging it out.

Additionally the taxing mechanic could utilize other taxes than just paying mana to do stuff. Inflexibly taxing mana has a good chance to affix unfriendly eyes on you whereas gaining a taxing benefit - say Smothering Tithe is less likely to breed anger toward you but may instill fear.

Anyway, I think it would be good for White to gain a little more design space and I think more colors being able to interact with the stack would be a good thing - even if that means Blue has to share some of their mechanics to a degree with another color.

AstroAA on [EDH][Primer] Sythis Enchantress Prison

1 month ago

H-E-N-R-Y I appreciate the comment, although I don't know what you mean by missing protection. As well, the deck does have a defined direction - stax'ing out the opponent and preventing them from playing Magic while still working on assembling our own win-con.

I do admit, I don't run a large amount of direct permanent-based protection. All I really run is:

• Lightning Greaves
• Sterling Grove
• Greater Auramancy
• Flickering Ward
• Alseid of Life's Bounty

However, I do run more spell based protection, namely being:

• Silence
• Veil of Summer
• Autumn's Veil
• Heroic Intervention

However, I also do run pieces that counter ETB abilities, which is what has been primarily used against me, (things like Acidic Slime and Reclamation Sage).

• Hushbringer
• Torpor Orb

I know in your version of Sythis you run a lot more aura spells. I'll be honest, I just don't like aura spells. I don't particularly have a good reason beyond that.

WotanubisReturned on Uw Scepter Control

1 month ago

Sweet summer child Counterspell is here and this may be the time you spoke of. Lazotep Plating for burn, Unsubstantiate for Abrupt Decay. I'm going to be playtesting Teferi, Time Raveler+Silenceon a scepter.

Grubbernaut on Moderndeck Killer

2 months ago

19 lands isn't enough, especially without cantrips.

My thoughts:

Silence isn't doing anything, here. You're not protecting a combo, so it's at best half of a time walk without a payoff.

Having one Circu also isn't doing anything; 99% of the time, you're going to wish you'd drawn something else that furthers your gameplan.

I would cut those five cards, both Ashioks, the Surgicals, the Scepters, and add 4x cantrips and 6x more lands. That'll give you a good base to get to your bigger spells consistently and handle the control plan. If you want some flexibility, you could go for some MDFC lands, as well.

Cheers!

Brirro on Teysa, Orzhov Scion - kinda cEDH (WB)

2 months ago

I recommend running Silence it will allow you to stop other players from winning, to buy yourself a turn to win. I also recommend running a few more stax pieces, to slow down your opponents to give yourself a greater chance of winning. For example Drannith Magistrate

legendofa on Plains/Water First deck

2 months ago

Basically, Isochron Scepter lets you choose a spell, and then cast that spell every turn. If the spell you choose is Silence , then you can cast Silence every time your opponent starts their turn. This prevents them from ever casting a spell, so they're stuck with whatever they already have out. Does that make sense?

Since you don't own Grand Abolisher , take it out. That frees up about $30 to spread around and improve your other cards. You could get an extra copy of Narset Transcendent and two more Path to Exile s and still have $8-10 left over if you drop Grand Abolisher , Citadel Siege , and one of the Valorous Stance s. It's almost always better to have multiple copies of your best cards, to make it more likely you draw them.