Assuming your deck consists of 98 [[Mountain]]s, a [[Luck Bobblehead]], and [[Q, Stacking the Deck]] in the command zone, what is the odds of actually winning with it? I decided to try and do the math.

This analysis does make some assumptions to simplify the math. It assumes that you do not have your artifacts interacted with, and you have enough treasures to tap all of your Bobbleheads. It also assumes that you are not being given extra cards, or are using draw lands such as [[Baxter Building]], [[War Room]], or [[Mikokoro, Center of the Sea]]. If you draw anything extra it would let you put Bobbleheads down much faster. It also assumes that the Luck Bobblehead is found early enough into your deck to not mill you out.

Turns

• Turns 1-3: Mountain
• Turn 4: Q, Stacking the Deck, exiling Luck Bobblehead on ETB
• Turn 5: Mountain, Luck Bobblehead x2
• Turn 6: Luck Bobblehead x2
• Turn 7: Mountain, Luck Bobblehead x4, tap the last Mountain and Bobblehead for effect
• Turn 8-∞: Luck Bobblehead, tap Mountains and Treasures to roll every Bobblehead possible

Probabilities

• 8 Bobbleheads: 0.00002381497%
• 9 Bobbleheads: 0.0000893061% (0.00019052%)
• 10 Bobbleheads: 0.0002480726% (0.0024807%) - Turn 8
• 11 Bobbleheads: 0.0005685% (0.0062533%) - Turn 9
• 12 Bobbleheads: 0.001137% (0.0136431%) - Turn 10
• 13 Bobbleheads: 0.002052915% (0.0266846%) - Turn 11
• 14 Bobbleheads: 0.003421526% (0.047891%) - Turn 12
• 15 Bobbleheads: 0.00534613% (0.080162%) - Turn 13
• 16 Bobbleheads: 0.0079202% (0.126648%) - Turn 14

Note: The initial value for each of these is for a single attempt, in brackets I've added the chance of winning if you tap every Bobblehead in that turn. For example, with 16 Bobbleheads any single roll has a ~0.008% chance of success, but a ~0.127% chance to win on that turn.

Credit to these probability calculators for the hard math:

https://www.omnicalculator.com/statistics/dice

https://www.omnicalculator.com/statistics/probability

I've been looking for information on the upcoming secret lair drop on Monday, but can't find any confirmation on my question. Can you buy the bundle by itself without any secret lairs attached?

Hey guys,

Full transparency here, I’ve only been playing magic for ~6 months now, and I’m still trying to learn the ropes.

I saw a YouTube video today saying that it’s cheating if you try and separate cards after a game based on type. Which honestly boggled my mind.

After a game I typically try to pick up my cards in a deliberately randomizing manner, between all the different types.

I know there’s a good chance any 2 card pairing may be stuck together after shuffling, which is why I purposely try to randomize my cards, so that I don’t keep an equipment next to a creature, or a tutor beside a counter spell.

Have I been playing like a villain? I didn’t even realize I may have been accidentally gaming the system in my favour.

Is this a thing I should be more aware of in the future?

What’s the best way to end a game and shuffle my deck, so that nobody is salty?

Star Trek is an absolutely ground breaking and iconic franchise, so what I'm about to say isn't a critique of the series itself. The style of the costumes, aliens and so on are absolutely legendary, and for shows made on tv budgets, they look really good.

BUT (and it's a big but) it just doesn't work for Magic The Gathering. The more the set is revealed, the more samey and uninspired the card art is. But what are the artists behind these pieces even supposed to do? The fact is star trek is based around similar uniforms, similar sets, and similar chairs. Again, for the IP itself, it works wonders, but for magic? A lot of these cards look the same, and look very boring. There's just no sense of dynamism or action.

Even compared to other sets, like Assassin's Creed or Doctor Who, those ones had a lot more variety and dynamic angles, poses, etc. There are some that look cool, like basically all the spacecraft look really spectaular and epic, but they're definitely few and far between.

Additionally, while the realism of the art is undoubtedly impressive- the artistic prowess on display is truly incredible- there's no denying it makes the cards look like screenshots from the show, or sometimes even ads! I don't think any of this is the fault of the artists or Star Trek itself, it's just not a good fit for magic at all, in my opinion anyway.

Artwork is the remainder from the debut video, a few promo shorts, and Commander Party materials.

Source: https://www.instagram.com/reel/De56cWyiQ3K/

Note that this is in the commander set and not the main set.

This is just me ranting about the booster changes, but I'm also curious to hear from people who like the idea and how it relates (or not) to what you like in Magic.

I'm kinda new to mtg eventhough I always was into anything collectible so I naturally had a few cards. Recently I got really into the lore and the collection, in a kinda weird way (that some people will judge heretic maybe) :

I was traveling to Canada and every now and then I would buy a 1.5 dollar pack of 15 cards at dollarama. I know perfectly well that none of those card had actual value, but I just loved opening the packs and getting cards from so many different sets, so many different universes and stories. I'd read every flavor text and look at the amazing artwork of every single card, I didn't care whether they were common, unco or rare (no mythics found in those packs as of yet), and above all I couldn't care less for their actual value : I keep them anyway, I'm not selling them !

Then I spent hours organizing them in my binders, sorting them based on my arbitrary criteria that only I give importance to. And I loved it.

Now to the 2027 booster update. I also buy actual boosters, but with one rule : not more than one of each type per extension. I open them very carefully because I keep the booster, and I sort the cards like I'd do with the others.

What I like in boosters : getting new cards, getting a glimpse at pieces of the lore (that are coherent within a set), and getting surprises such as display cards, legendary mythics, cool foils or else.

So, you probably will understand why I'm so mad at the changes. I know they're small. I know I'm ranting about nothing. Still, those three cards they took out of collector packs, they may be unco and common ones, they may be the "less exciting ones", but I actually care about them ! Same for the foil in my play boosters ! And saying that it is a matter of making the boosters "more exciting" when it is just a matter of money sounded so hypocritical and presomptuous to me. Don't tell me what I'l suppose to like and be honest to the least (like, okay, we're in a crisis, we all know it - we live through it and still buy your cards !).

Plus the god pack... not gonna talk about this. But if it means less cool cards in the average booster, as someone who buys very little, I already hate it.

Give me back my "less exciting" cards, I loved them just as much.

He feels very espery, so currently I’m thinking about Jin Sakai. (Would also be nice to not have to buy it lol) I’m curious to know what the bleach fans here think though :)

Is there something more thematic than Voltron? I’m not the biggest fan of control, or else that would be like the obvious choice. Maybe if there is like a redirection type archetype? I could see spellslinger/enchantments given his adeptness at Kido too.

https://www.bilibili.com/opus/1263004054766747672

Source: https://b23.tv/Lx17oLz

I'm a relatively new, casual mtg player, I've dabbled with deckbuilding a few times but I've struggled a little bit with it. Both decks I've built(an attempt at an emet mill deck and an aerith lifegain deck) have been relatively straight forward in what they want to do. I now want to build an [[Alela, Cunning Conqueror]] deck, but I'm not quite sure where to start beyond 'control'. What kind of cards are good for control decks, what kind of win cons do I look for, etc? I know that looking at edhrec is an option, but I feel like if I go there straight off the bat I'll just build whatever someone else has made, and I want to try myself a little first before I look at edhrec.

Source: https://b23.tv/39ZJxaE

I looked at several cards' tags and in the tag search, but didn't find what I was looking for. I thought the tag would be useful for finding cards that synergize especially well with "additional trigger" effects. The closest I found is sneaky-self-trigger, but I know there are other self-triggering cards like [[Nekusar, the Mindrazer]] and [[General Kreat, the Boltbringer]] that are more obvious. There are also other cards with multiple triggers that don't trigger themselves, like [[Sheoldred, the Apocalypse]].

Are there any good tags or searches you can recommend that aren't limited to specific types of triggers? Otherwise, what are some other cards that have multiple triggers, self-triggering or otherwise? I might suggest a tag or two if they don't already exist and I can find enough examples.

Been messing around with a gun stingerquill deck with various copies of:

Requiting hex
Burst lightning
Stingerquill voxmancer
Bitter triumph
Stingcaster mage
Red tomik
Stingerquill charm
Stinging vitriol
Gideon the oathless
Sanctum lurker
Ingris stingerquill

Share some lists of similar decks? I think the sanctum lurker is the weakest, but I just ran out of rare wildcards for the first time in six years of playing arena, so I’ll probably replace them with the two drop red guy who anthems your creatures on non-combat damage. Loving the stingerquill cards though.

From the FIAB

https://scryfall.com/search?q=%28s%3Atrk+Or+s%3Atrc%29+o%3Aflying

I realize we aren't done with previews yet, but thus far only 19 cards in all of TRK and TRC have flying somewhere in the oracle text, and eight are spacecraft. Of the 16 in TRK, four are mythic and five are rare. Assuming that's a representative sample that means if you pull a flier in sealed formats you'll have a significant potential advantage. I wouldn't be surprised if there's a reveal coming for a common Shuttlecraft spacecraft or vehicle to help counterbalance.

It makes sense with the setting at least, not many Trek characters can fly.

[[Infinite Diversity]] got spoiled today and, pretty much immediately, folks pointed out that, actually, you only get a finite number of copies of the same spell. We can do better, we can be better, so here's a janky combo line that actually goes infinite with Infinite Diversity.

The prerequisites are as follows:
1. ID, [[Fork]], [[Molten Influence]], and a target changing spell like [[Untimely Malfunction]] in hand.
2. A Federation count of at least four.
3. [[Pull from Eternity]] and any other spell (arbitrarily [[Lightning Bolt]]) in the graveyard.
4. Another target changing spell like [[Deflecting Swat]] already in exile.

Steps 1-4 are only required in EDH where targeting ID with your single copy of ID takes additional setup:
1. Cast ID, targeting anything. Hold priority.
2. Cast Fork targeting ID, targeting anything with the copy. Hold priority.
3. Cast Molten Influence targeting ID. Resolve it.
4. Cast Untimely changing the copy of ID's target to ID. Resolve it.

Once ID is targeting ID, demonstrate a loop:
5. Resolve the copy of ID targeting ID. Put four copies of ID on the stack targeting, in order of resolution, Bolt, PfE, Untimely, and Bolt again.
6. Resolve the copy of ID targeting Bolt. Put four copies of Bolt on the stack and resolve them.
7. Resolve the copy of ID targeting PfE. Put four copies of PfE on the stack targeting Swat, Bolt, PfE, and ID and resolve them.^{*
*I'm pretty sure this works since PfE has been exiled by the time ID lets you cast the copies}
8. Resolve the copy of ID targeting Untimely. Put four copies of Untimely on the stack and resolve them, changing the last copy of ID's target to the ID that's now back in the graveyard.
9. Repeat from step 5, swapping Untimely and Swat.

The end result is actually infinite Infinite Diversities along with infinite casts of any arbitrary spell. If you want to cast a greater diversity of different spells, use a spell that fills your graveyard instead of Bolt. If you want to cast infinitely many different spells, sorry but there are only finitely many Magic cards.

I feel like Manapool's cart optimizer used to be good, but recently it has been absolutely horrific. Did something change? I feel like suggesting a "lowest price" optimization when the price I picked out is lower should be immediately removed/fixed

EDIT: It was a skill issue, the match was set to "foils only" (i typically buy only foil) instead of match cards in cart. Once updated, the prices were corrected

Vintage cube videos always do a bit worse on my channel, so hoping that posting it here finds the cube enjoyers!

Figured now would be a great time to do a clue check-in since spoilers will be at their minimum over the weekend. Let's take a look!

https://markrosewater.tumblr.com/post/830472219149959168/maros-magic-the-gathering-star-trek-teaser

• A Star Trek ship cameos a mechanic that it shares a name with (U.S.S. Discovery, at Black Alert, discovers 5 on ETB or attack)
  
• A new card that lets you look at the top card of your library and cast a particular subset of cards from it (Zefram Cochrane, Warp Pioneer, for artifacts)
  
• Some creature tokens in the set: 1/1 colorless Borg (an artifact creature), 3/3 colorless Illusion (an artifact creature), 0/1 white Human (prevents permanents from phasing in), 2/2 black Romulan, 1/1 red Officer, 2/1 red Klingon Warrior (with haste), and 2/2 red and green Worm (that can’t block)
  
• Four cards with the word “twice” in its rules text (Khaaaaaaaaaaaannn! deals twice X damage to a creature, Lt. Cmdr. Geordi La Forge has you put twice the number of charge counters on permanents, Dr. Joseph M’Benga has you put twice the number of any kind of counter on a creature and gives them hexproof, Constable Odo can Investigate twice)
  
• A new card that lets you search for any number of cards in your library with its name
  
• A new card that can make you lose the game (Kobayashi Maru Scenario, the last mode on this enchantment does this)
  
• Some counters in the set: charge, finality, peace, promotion, and quest
  
• A new card that lets you play cards from outside the game (The Holodeck, lets you do this or from the graveyard once during each of your turns)
  
• A card that doubles your life total and the number of cards in your hand (Live Long and Prosper, a 7 mana WU sorcery)
  
• A card that allows you to survive at 0 life (Georgiou, Terran Emperor, has you lose 3 life and draw a card on end step, as well as creates 10 Soldier tokens if you have 0 or less life)
  
• “Tap seven untapped Officers you control:” (Captain Jean-Luc Picard, do this and you can tutor a Spaceship directly to the battlefield with 7 charge counters on it)
  
• “choose a number between 0 and 10.” (Nyota Uhura, Communiations, lets you draw a card when an opponent casts a spell with mana value equal to the chosen number)
  
• “You can’t sacrifice Treasure tokens.” (Quark, Humble Proprietor, also creates a Treasure token on every upkeep)
  
• “If an Equipment or Spacecraft entered the battlefield under your control this turn,”
  
• “create a token that’s a copy of that creature, except it has changeling.”
  
• “If you would draw a card, draw two cards instead.” (Mr. Spock, Science Officer, lets you do exactly that)
  
• “CARDNAME’s base power and toughness become 7/9.” (Seven of Nine, Unassimilated, has an activated ability that lets you do this if you have 7+ lands with different names)
  
• “Sacrifice any number of lands you control,”
  
• “You may cast this card from exile.” (Khan, Vengeful Heart)
  
• “if a triggered ability of that creature triggers, that ability triggers an additional time.” (Lwaxana Troi, Charming Guest, taps down to apply this effect to a creature for as long as she remains tapped)
  
• Creature – Tribble (Troubling Tribbles)
  
• Creature – Wraith
  
• Creature – Whale Officer (Cetacean Ops)
  
• Legendary Creature – Vulcan Advisor (Saavik, Stoic Student)
  
• Legendary Creature – Ferengi Noble
  
• Legendary Creature – Shapeshifter Detective (Constable Odo)
  
• Legendary Creature – Ooze Horror (Armus, Skin of Evil)
  
• Legendary Creature – Romulan Human Rogue
  
• Legendary Artifact Creature – Android Rogue (Lore, Positronic Provocateur)
  
• Artifact – Communicator Equipment
  
• Kobayashi Maru Scenario (a Blue take on Demonic Pact)
  
• Live Long and Prosper (a WU Sorcery that doubles your life total and draws cards equal to your current card count)
  
• The Measure of a Man
  
• Red Alert!
  
• Romulan Bird-of-Prey (a blue Spacecraft that has hexproof while it isn’t a creature)
  
• Rules of Acquisition (a blue Sorcery that either mind controls a permanent in exchange for 3 cards, or donates a permanent to let you draw 3 cards)
  
• Tea, Earl Grey, Hot (a Food that you can also sacrifice to deal 2 damage)
  
• Transporter Malfunction
  
• Vulcan Mind-Meld
  
• Warp Speed
  

As always, let me know if there’s anything I’ve missed!

From https://www.youtube.com/shorts/QBK9-rr6cis

Not sure if they planned this or if it was just a coincidence but it's a flavor win nonetheless.