Swords to Plowshares

Instant

Exile target creature. Its controller gains life equal to its power.

Legality

Format	Legality
1v1 Commander	Legal
Arena	Legal
Block Constructed	Legal
Canadian Highlander	Legal
Commander / EDH	Legal
Commander: Rule 0	Legal
Duel Commander	Legal
Gladiator	Legal
Highlander	Legal
Historic	Legal
Legacy	Legal
Leviathan	Legal
Limited	Legal
Modern	Legal
Oathbreaker	Legal
Oldschool 93/94	Legal
Premodern	Legal
Tiny Leaders	Legal
Vintage	Legal
Casual	Legal
Custom	Legal
Quest Magic	Legal

Discussion (49)

uth_matar on I have Earthquake on the …

7 hours ago

I have Radiant Scrollwielder and cast a 13-point Earthquake

While Earthquake is on the stack my opponent responds with Swords to Plowshares targeting my Radiant Scrollwielder.

I'm at 10 life (opponent at 20) and have no answer, the StP resolves, then my Earthquake. Does my Earthquake have lifelink? Or did I just get schooled and kill myself?

HiddenDeftElm on Wyleth's One Stop Prop Shop

1 week ago

Add: - Raiyuu, Storm's Edge - Swords to Plowshares - Lion Sash - Lizard Blades - Komainu Battle Armor - Rabbit Battery - Alpine Meadow - Rugged Prairie - Arid Mesa - Needleverge Pathway  ^Flip - Sacred Foundry - Command Tower - Great Furnace - Reliquary Tower - Inventors' Fair - Eiganjo, Seat of the Empire

plakjekaas on Pattern Recognition #239 - Ajani, …

1 week ago

There's also 38 cards in the game with "Proliferate" on them, like Evolution Sage, which can all put one loyalty counter on every planeswalker you control.

I'd say Ajani Unyielding's -2 is more of a Swords to Plowshares than a Path to Exile.

hoosteen on Revised Rin & Seri

1 week ago

IMO, as a removal spell, Decimate is neither an instant or low-mana. It can certainly do a lot of damage to the board state, but I would much rather have a Beast Within, Generous Gift, or perhaps a Swords to Plowshares or a Path to Exile.

I think you might be going a little heavy on the ramp. In a green three color deck, especially if you have all your shock and fetch lands, having three signets and three talismans is probably overkill.

Given that Rhythm of the Wild is under the ProtectMyBalls category, I'm assuming you're mostly using it for the can't be countered effect. In which case, I would consider how many of your creatures you think opponents are going to actually counter. Take a look through your list of creatures, then list all the ones you yourself would counter if an opponent played it. Then think if its really worth making those not counterable instead of some other card. While there may be a few which you don't want to be counterable, also consider the order these cards need to be played and that you will need Rhythm of the Wild out before you play your big stuff. IMO the chances are too slim.

I think the most glaring change I would make is adding some more card draw. There is very little if any explicit card draw in this deck. Given that your commander makes 1/1's left and right, consider a Skullclamp. Also, IMO Esper Sentinel belongs in any white deck. Since you're making tokens very often, a Welcoming Vampire would work well here, and also an Idol of Oblivion.

Looks like the vast majority of your Good Boys And Good Girls are actually girls and not many boys. Is that intentional? Or are the cats in MTG just generally better or more abundant than the dogs?

Otherwise, be on the lookout for the usefulness of Second Harvest. I've personally removed that from at least one of my decks since I think its kinda a "win-more" card. For it to be actually really valuable you already need to have at least a few tokens out. But, I've definitely drawn that card when I don't have any tokens out and its screwed me over. Granted, your deck makes tokens quite easily, so this might be a good card for this deck. Just something to maybe watch out for.

Lastly, take a look at your deck's average CMC. Its relatively low but you might be able to trim it down a bit. It might help to consider the CMC of a given card vs the CMC of your commander. In general, I like to make that comparison since in-game, if I have a card in my hand that is 4 CMC and my commander is 4 CMC, I am more likely to play my commander, then next turn I want to either play something 5 CMC or multiple lesser CMCs. Also, at the beginning of the game, you want to increase the chances that you're drawing cards which you can play before your commander, otherwise you have wasted turns at the beginning.

Guerric on [Primer] Helming the Host of Heaven: A Giada Guide

2 weeks ago

Game Report, May 10, 2021

I got in three more games last night, and got to test the deck out a bit more. It was again 1v1 unfortunately, but it was a strong matchup vs a highly optimized Ghalta, Primal Hunger deck that has no problem killing off single opponents incredibly quickly, so I was playing by the seat of my pants the whole time, though I won all three games. The first game was the tightest, and showcased the power of Bishop of Wings, Soul Warden and Archangel of Thune in particular, who were the MVPs of the match. I had a strong start with a turn one Sol Ring, but made up for it by missing my land drops for several turns against a deck with crazy ramp and endless resources and fatties, but was able to get through it due to my curve and Giada, who allowed me to consistently play threats turn after turn, and the almight power of Bishop of Wings, Soul Warden, and Righteous Valkyrie, who effortlessly healed me through several battles. What was threatening me however, was commander damage from Ghalta, as I could only afford to take three more before dying, forcing me to commit all of my angels besides Giada (and Righteous Valkyrie who he had removed with Beast Within to blocking Ghalta, resulting in their deaths. I was left with only Giada, Bishop of Wings, Soul Warden, and four spirit tokens that I got from Bishop of Wings when my other angels had died. What's worse, my opponent had paid Lurking Predators, so every time I cast a spell he got to put free creatures onto the battlefield. Thankfully, that turn I played Archangel of Thune, and the die was cast. When it ETB'd, both Bishop of Wings and Soul Warden procc'ed, putting 2 +1/+1 counters on everything. Lurking Predators then worked against him, because when his creature entered, Soul Warden procc'ed and Archangel of Thune put another counter on all of my things, including the four spirit tokens I had put out. While Feed the Pack would have allowed him to go wide with many 2/2 wolf tokens, he couldn't do that since the dynamic duo of Archangel of Thune and Soul Warden would only pump my aerial team to astronomically high power. I was able to swing in for lethal and the game was over! To the many on the forums and elsewhere who lecture other builders that the Soul Sisters aren't that great and one life isn't that big of a deal, I think they need to think about their synergy with the deck's gameplan, something that a match like this showcases!

The MVP of game two was Linvala, Keeper of Silence. He had an incredibly explosive start and probably would have killed me by turn six or so, except that on turn three I played Linvala with Giada, right after he had played Llanowar Tribe, which was now a cute 3/3 with no other powers. Even so he was able to play Omnath, Locus of Mana, store some mana, cast his commander, and be a couple of points away from a lethal play with some other synergies he had, but Linvala held him down long enough for my growing angel army to chip away his life total to zero.

On the third game the shoe was on the other foot from the first one, and he didn't have the acceleration he needed to put up a threat to my quickly goldfishing angelic armada. Lacking key removal spells, he three a ten power Nessian Boar at me in order to kill my best pieces of his choice and to draw a ton of cards. I responded at instant speed with a Swords to Plowshares, preserved my board, and swept in the next turn to knock him down to two life. He wasn't able to recover and the game was done.

This was a particularly helpful play session in highlighting the power of some key cards like Soul Warden, Bishop of Wings, Archangel of Thune, and Linvala, Keeper of Silence, as well as the importance of having the right amount of good, premium, white removal in hand, which made a big difference in the outcome of the second and third games. The only card I didn't care for in one of the games was Mirror Entity, which confirms its likely cutting from the deck in the next update. I hope these game reports are helpful to the community as you build your decks!

Ojallday on Dealing with politics as an …

3 weeks ago

I have a friend that ran Markov who had a similar problem. Due to the nature of the deck you drop all of your creatures and kill one player. His solution was to transition to a mid-range strategy. Simply put he would cast early game threats to put pressure on other players, but they didn't win him the game or kill a player, so that he could win the game on later turns. Since I don't know how you are losing I'll put forward a few ways players stop Markov decks and how to counter those strategies.

First, are players killing you when all of you creatures are tapped down? Keep some of your creatures back as blockers, this is obvious and the strategy goes against how agro players operate in most formats but is needed in multiplayer environments. Along the same lines are white spells that can untap all of your creatures on other players turns like Battle Cry and Call to Glory leading to fun combat tricks to kill off important creatures and more importantly save your life total.

Second, are players board wiping constantly to knock down your board state? This was the problem my friend had and after two board wipes he would be out of cards in hand with no board state top decking hoping for some sort of Windfall. There are a few ways to counter this which can be focused on individually or can be mixed for similar results. Making it so your creatures don't die is one method featuring spells like Boros Charm and Teferi's Protection. Another is mass reanimation spells like Faith's Reward, Patriarch's Bidding and Living Death. Finally are flexible spells that essentially replace the creatures you lost. Those being Reprocess, Plumb the Forbidden or Village Rites.

Third, playing politics. Like you said there is not much stopping the rest of the table from ganging up on you, you can however influence other players decisions based on how you play and how others at your table play as well. Hold back threats, it's tempting to dump your hand and start swinging but as you mentioned this makes you a huge target. Instead put down a Coat of Arms or another value spell and hold the rest of your mana open for interaction, which leads to my next point interaction. You have some of the best removal spells in the game in your colors like Fracture,Dreadbore, Anguished Unmaking and Swords to Plowshares all of which are great bargaining chips to use as favors for other players, as well as being useful to take care of things causing problems for you. Last of all are less card choices but more how you address the table, having a good pokerface helps a lot with this. At the start of the game address the commanders others are playing and talk to the group about the powerful synergies they employ. Whenever an important combo or synergy price is played by an opponent point it out to the other players and if it's very strong stress it needs to be dealt with, which may incline the other players to use spells on it, reducing what they can use against you and making it so you don't have to deal with the problem. When a Tutor is cast discuss what spell the player could be gettng, this will draw attention to them and away from you. Finally when players address your board shift focus away from it, point out another player with the winning board state or the deck that won the last game. Downplay that you are a threat until you are ready to win the game. Keep in mind you are still an agro deck, so you can always lean into dumping your hand to kill a player fast if the game match up calls for it.

This final section is just general deck construction. Vampire selection: make sure you vampires are doing more that entering the battlefield to create an extra Vampire through eminence. Things like Blood Artist and Viscera Seer give value when opponents interact with the board and thing like Twilight Prophet draws cards. There are also the vampire lords that buff all of your vampires and tokens. Things that have synergy with your strategy are good includes too like Sanguine Bond, Impact Tremors or Goblin Bombardment and go a long way. Finally is "normal" card advantage that doesn't rely on you having vampires out and will shine in the early game as well as add value late game, Greed, Phyrexian Arena and Wheel of Misfortune.

I hope some of my thoughts help you work out a good game plan.

Guerric on Faeries

4 weeks ago

I'd also add that you have great artifact and enchantment-based removal like Darksteel Mutation and Imprisoned in the Moon. I've found this super powerful in my Tuvasa enchantress deck, and prefer it to spell removal in the case of all but the most efficient cards (such as Swords to Plowshares and Path to Exile). These are especially good when you can use them at instant speed, which you can here with Leyline of Anticipation and Vedalken Orrery. One that I'd recommend that works even without these out is Stasis Snare, as you can flash it out at instant speed. I'd also add Coastal Piracy as a replacement for one of your less impactful draw spells. I'd personally replace Windfall unless you are running it to disrupt your opponents' tutoring, in which case it makes sense to keep it in. If you are just using it as a draw spell though, something like Piracy would be a good replacement.

This looks like a great deck and I look forward to hearing how you destroy your opponents with it!

Niko9 on If white isn't "allowed" to …

4 weeks ago

I agree completely with plakjekaas. Definitely wouldn't want to sit across from a mono-white boardwipe tribal deck that can consistently draw a different wipe on most turns, and stax and things would be really rough too.

White really hasn't been in a bad spot. It does what it does, and does it by far the best. In any other color Swords to Plowshares would be borderline bannable. One green or blue or black to exile a commander, at instant speed, would be nuts.

I just don't think that white needs any big changes. It seems like they are pumping it again in New Capenna (though I haven't checked out the set too much) and that's a little scary. These things remind me of back in the day when green was the weakest color, then they added good draw to green, and now look at the monster it created. Elfball and big finishers have been around forever, but when they gave green one more type of piece, it became by far the best color.

I say buff red. Red's effects plus good consistent draw would be much less oppressive than white's effects with good draw. I think anyways : )