Horde Magic

http://www.quietspeculation.com/2011/09/horde-magic-a-new-way-to-play-magic-and-survive-zombie-invasions/

Interesting format listed over at Quiet Speculation. A cooperative format that pits the players against a zombie horde. Looks kinda cool!

wow i am REALLY excited about this!!! it's definitely adaptable for Big Deck, and also i can make any type of Horde deck... Goblins, Squirrels, whatever.

so glad i save all my tokens!

Or hybrid invasions.

"It's the ZOMBIES... and also the SQUIRRELS!"

Each person should have their own horde deck.

"Look out! It's the Allies!"

If their only token wasn't an old Player Rewards card from Legions, I'd say someone needs to make a Sliver Horde.

hey i was thinking of making an Ally Horde deck just now!

Uniclonus wrote:If their only token wasn't an old Player Rewards card from Legions, I'd say someone needs to make a Sliver Horde.

my inkjet says otherwise!

MidniteEffort wrote:my inkjet says otherwise!

Yeah, that's always a workable Option B.

Think of some of the mean Hordes one could come up with. Deathtouching Wurms, Angels, Demons, Dragons.

MidniteEffort wrote:wow i am REALLY excited about this!!! it's definitely adaptable for Big Deck, and also i can make any type of Horde deck... Goblins, Squirrels, whatever.

so glad i save all my tokens!

Cool idea, im into it, and i too am always saving tokens -for a while now. I'd often collect tokens left behind for trash after deck building or gameplay by others, and now im glad ive had that habit!

intrinsic wrote:

MidniteEffort wrote:wow i am REALLY excited about this!!! it's definitely adaptable for Big Deck, and also i can make any type of Horde deck... Goblins, Squirrels, whatever.

so glad i save all my tokens!

Cool idea, im into it, and i too am always saving tokens -for a while now. I'd often collect tokens left behind for trash after deck building or gameplay by others, and now im glad ive had that habit!

me too!! i even got the TO at the store to round them up for me after a draft. he gave me a GIANT stack two weeks ago!

So should we list the horde we're making, so that we don't double up (not that it would be the worst)?

I also imagine we'll need to tweak to get the numbers right (cards in deck, number of tokens/spells, player starting life total). There will be several games where the zombies are speedbumps for the players, and several games that are over on turn 4 after mass zombie outbreak.

I'll start building the zombie horde if no one else wants it. I have to amass a few cards, but that shouldn't be too hard.

GOBLIN HORDE

http://deckbox.org/sets/87957

gotta cut it down. any suggestions?

also, a couple of my cards offer the horde "decisions"... and i'm just going to make them random.

also, i guess if the Horde draws cards, they are cast the next upkeep in addition to the regular flipping action (this is just like if they were bounced.) also do the token cards go to the graveyard?

i'm also going to assume that the hordies can't block, so if i have something like Angel's Trumpet out, they can't block the next turn.

oh yea, and it'll be a number of the different Goblin tokens... including Goblin Soldier and Goblin Rogue.

THIS IS MY CUBE

MidniteEffort wrote:GOBLIN HORDE

http://deckbox.org/sets/87957

gotta cut it down. any suggestions?

also, a couple of my cards offer the horde "decisions"... and i'm just going to make them random.

also, i guess if the Horde draws cards, they are cast the next upkeep in addition to the regular flipping action (this is just like if they were bounced.) also do the token cards go to the graveyard?

i'm also going to assume that the hordies can't block, so if i have something like Angel's Trumpet out, they can't block the next turn.

oh yea, and it'll be a number of the different Goblin tokens... including Goblin Soldier and Goblin Rogue.

THIS IS MY CUBE

Horde creatures cannot block, i think that was the consensus rule in the link.

I have questions about building.
For example, not necessarily what i would build, but if its an existing edh deck, lets say of slivers, you just take all the land out and also take out any cards that require choices or decisions correct? What about cards like Sliver Overlord that require a choice in searching slivers? And i think i read the horde deck has infinite mana, so wouldnt that make sliver queen completely broken??

*flip sliver Queen*
*everyone scoops*
LOL

intrinsic wrote:
Horde creatures cannot block, i think that was the consensus rule in the link.

I have questions about building.
For example, not necessarily what i would build, but if its an existing edh deck, lets say of slivers, you just take all the land out and also take out any cards that require choices or decisions correct? What about cards like Sliver Overlord that require a choice in searching slivers? And i think i read the horde deck has infinite mana, so wouldnt that make sliver queen completely broken??

activated abilities are out the window. you think a Zombie horde knows how to tell Sliver Queen to pump out a Sliver... nope, it doesn't. i guess the decision to activate an activated ability is a decision the Horde can't make.

i think anything in the Horde deck with a "may" ability should become a "must" ability. i'm only going to have triggered abilities on the non-token cards. a couple of these are really good, but are "may"s... like Boggart Shenanigans. if we treat that as a "must", and because the life total is shared, there's no choice in who gets pinged. this upholds the "AI" facet of Horde Magic.

Ok, so now im looking to physically build one of these decks.
You cant just take an edh deck and put tokens in as they suggest. I had only glanced at it while at work at first.
For a single player match you ideally want what -roughly 75 spells and 25 tokens?

And then if i wanted to make it 2 player i strip 25 spells and add 25 more tokens?

intrinsic wrote:Ok, so now im looking to physically build one of these decks.
You cant just take an edh deck and put tokens in as they suggest. I had only glanced at it while at work at first.
For a single player match you ideally want what -roughly 75 spells and 25 tokens?

And then if i wanted to make it 2 player i strip 25 spells and add 25 more tokens?

the article says to just count out a chunk of the 100-card deck, scaled down for the number of players, regardless of spell-to-token ratio. just random.

also, the deck is balanced it seems for 60 tokens and 40 spells.

Additional Players:

When you have more Survivors, the Horde becomes easier to defeat. So the number cards that the Survivors face is determined by players.

Solo – 45 Cards
2 Players – 60 Cards
3 Players – 75 Cards
4 Players – 100 Cards

The Horde deck is 100 cards, so just shuffle and take a chunk at random.

i made a zombie horde deck that is 45/55 spells to tokens.

now to play against it!

Gave this a spin on Sunday at C&M. It was a pretty interesting format, with a few adjustments I had to make.

I only had about 60 or so cards, with 40 being tokens and the other 20 being spells. We had a 4 man game, played about 5 games, and came to some interesting conclusions.

In game one we started at 20 life and completely crushed the zombie horde. Like, they had no chance. It could be that someone landed a turn 5 Emrakul and just went to town on the deck. Apparently Herbert West is no match of Cthulhu (ba dum ching!). Also, we flipped three tokens and an ineffectual zombie that we were easily able to block.

We decided to make it a little more challenging, and changed it to stopping the zombie horde after 2 non-token cards. We lost that game... fast. It could be we were a little cocky, having beaten the other one so easily. After a weak t1 from the zombies, we attacked for about 5. Then we flipped about 7 zombies and a zealous persecution.

Most games after that started with our losing about 15 life by turn 5, then spending the rest of the game trying to claw ourselves back. Lifelink helped a lot, though when I flipped Innocent Blood (I always just chose to sac a zombie token) or Fleshbag Marauder, that would often hit pretty hard. We only won two games after that (that I can remember, anyway). In one of them, I got an early Spike Weaver and Mimic Vat down. Next turn, the zombies hit a Fleshbag Marauder, and I had mana to fog, then I had a free fog each turn. In the other one, we would have died to a nasty zombie alpha attack of about 20 or so, but I had a disk ready. Next turn, Joel attacked for the final amount.

I'm looking to add some more board sweepers, both symmetrical and a (Damnation and Plague Wind). Also, it would be great to be able to find a non-creature board sweeper. All is Dust would be nice (and at least somewhat flavorful), but something to kill artifacts would be good. Shatterstorm? Akroma's Vengeance (bleh...)?

The most fun was probably our quoting zombie memes along the way. I refused to play Elesh Norn during the games, mechanically because that would be an instant game over for the zombies, but flavorfully because "those are people we knew! People we loved! And damnit, we have to see if we can save them!" We called the first game the "first wave" of zombies, the one where we easily beat them and think this is going to be a piece of cake, before the real horde comes. And we considered playing halfway through the zombie deck, then breaking out a warrior deck, representing the horde that breaks into the shopping mall to steal supplies.

Good stuff all around!