I challenge thee... to Transcend!

Smokincookz

To use the most “unplayable” card(s) and make them work in a deck, somehow. 

I don’t mean the weenies with no effects that are a waste of space- but cards that their inherent effects are so beyond niche that they will never see play. Treacherous Blessing has plenty of utility beyond the initial glance at it. I suppose even Allure of the Unknown could have some function (give Greg Transcendence with it! Hah!).

In my mind/experience, the card Transcendence from TOR fits the bill 100%. You should have seen my face one fine Seize the Day, where I played it once, thinking the lose-game condition applied to my opponent too (always read that fine print!). 😵

If that were the way it worked, you could just keep it in-hand, disabled, and drop it down when sure that Greg would lose. That one crucial line of text makes the card go from unplayable (as it is printed) to completely broken. I was a fool to think they’d ever print it like that- but then again, Angel of Destiny lurketh about...

Still, there are some of you out there who will never give up on trying to break a mediocre card. This one is downright awful, and will almost always kill you. Anyone up for a monumental challenge? 

So far, the only use I’ve found is to master the card for XP, and to enjoy the artwork as profile pic. Of course, each match I only exile it if drawn. I guess you could use Narset and dump it for 20 mana.

Using it in Role Reversal to give Greg the chance to off himself doesn’t really count... 😁

Smokincookz

Oh, of course, I should add, there is a whole thread on the topic of cards like this one. 

https://forums.d3go.com/discussion/83482/what-is-the-most-pointless-card-in-the-game

I read that thread at the time, but was too embarrassed to mention my massive blunder!

I recently noticed a bit of a trend, people challenging each other to make use of some really... difficult cards.

Figured if anyone managed to make Transcendence work, there should be a separate thread about it. If someone could pull that off, it would be a feat in and of itself. Allure of the Unknown, I think, is the only way.

I’m not sure, but Greg may just play the Transcendence like a fool! In fact, with Allure of the Unknown, we have a case of two useless cards possibly making a powerful combo? Amazing. 

Just don’t have any cards higher than 20 in the deck. Don’t play Allure until you have Transcendence in hand, and always disable that, obviously. I’m going to try it out soon! 

Legacy PvE perhaps? Make Nicol-Bolas off himself in Return of the God-Pharaoh, with a poor man’s method? Maybe add into a Kaya deck? 

Smokincookz

I am sad, Greg did NOT (yet) play the card when given to him. I suppose there are more chances it could happen, it was only one test so far. Perhaps other Planeswalkers would react differently.

*edit* (My tired brain failed me earlier, I totally remember reading the reddit post too, idk how I forgot. I knew I had found the combo somewhere, forgot who planted the idea. Props to the original discoverer, gave me a great challenge to expand upon.)

But, I am sad. I wonder if Greg is coded not to play certain other cards given to him, or is it only Transcendence?

I never did test Allure of the Unknown outside mastering it... 

Smokincookz

Ok, the only way I can see to force it onto Greg, is as a trollish counter-attack against Starfield of Nyx. Line up the Infinite Obliteration or choice of discard after giving it to Greg. 

But, it still requires having at least two-three card slots devoted, and depends ENTIRELY upon an opponent’s Starfield being out. That won’t hold up well in legacy at all.

Bil

You can try Sorin Markov vanguard's second ability ... There's no guarantee Greg will play it but it's an easy way to give him a copy.

Dont have that vanguard myself so i Can't confirm it's working though.

Smokincookz

@Bil
Interesting point, though I don’t have the card either. I don’t expect Greg to ever cast it voluntarily... so, I can think of one semi-tedious solution to make this combo to *maybe*  deliver results:

Have Starfield of Nyx in hand, cast Allure of Unknown. Preferably have another Allure and fetch ready to grab Transcendence, and the offensive discard lined up.

Hopefully, Greg plays the free Starfield. I mean, wouldn’t you? (Going to test it).
Then, drop the second Allure to give the lovely Transcendence gift, mill it from his hand, and boom, next turn, he should begin levitating. 🤞

I suppose anything you can send over to force the return of support would work. I haven’t found one that returns directly to play like Starfield does while digging thru cards yet. 

I have to say, if somehow a troll Greg pulled this combo off on a Starfield lockdown user, oh man, imagine the terrible surprise. Not out of the realms of possibility at all really, he cascades off with a great hand order somewhat regularly.

Smokincookz

Or, even if you snuck it into their GY, for any deck that relies on cheating many cards to play from there, ouch, that thing is poisonous as fetid tinykitty! Cards that specify creatures avoid it though. 

Too bad/good thing (😅) it’s not standard legal, whoo boy, that would be even worse than Grafdigger’s Cage, for GY-return decks! I frequently use Eerie Ultimatum, as do many others.

Smokincookz

Oh, since it’s on topic and I mentioned it around once before, I had a goal of pushing Mizzium Transreliquat from niche to semi-broken. Or at least fun. I think I can deliver on that goal now.

I’m not sure how reliable it is for competition, but it can be seriously bonkers, and fun. I’ve tried to make it able to keep up in legacy. I’m sure some of these new artifact creatures floating around could be integrated, but this is what I came up with.

I am very proud of this work. It’s all about exploiting the free artifact copies. Still a work in progress, I suppose. The only challenge so far is sometimes assembling the engine, but card draw and fetch, as always, tend to come through.

I call the deck “Mizzium, supercharged”. That’s what Urza and Stolen Identity do here- together, they supercharge this thing to the max.

Mizzium Transreliquat.
Saheeli, Sublime Artificer. (or Thassa, Deep-Dwelling.)
Insidious Will
Sundering Titan. (or choice of artifact creature, preferably worth cheating out many copies, and with a nasty EtB effect.)

Urza, Lord High Artificer. (Storm the Vault is still a workhorse, but I’d say use Urza if you can.)

Mirror Image. (or choice, another artifact creature, Mishra’s Self-Replicator, Traxos, Scourge of Kroog, or Emry, Lurker of the Loch.)

Stolen Identity.
Blue Sun’s Zenith. (or the ever-amazing utility of Day’s Undoing.)
Narset, Parter of Veils, for loop neutralization. (Or Apex of Power or Demolish, if feeling frisky.)
Ruinous Ultimatum. (or choice of removal.)

I usually play it with Nicol Bolas the Ravager, but the main deck shell is almost entirely available to blue alone, with a few adjustments. 

This thing is like some kind of crazy vehicle, with the engine-block itself made of cast Mizzium alloy! It screams once it gets going. Cool thing is, this sweet ride has three seats- Urza is always involved, I don’t think he can be replaced. I like Mirror Image for a cheap copy source, and Sundering Titan’s gem ripping EtB effect, but I think the passengers could be swapped out for some cool variants, like above, or others.

Smokincookz

CONFIRMED: Greg WILL cast the free Starfield if given to him!!!!

Omg, lol, this is it. You can totally poison his GY with the evil curse of Transcendence! I am so going to hit Bolas with this in RotGP one day!

Smokincookz

But then, just now had Narset refuse to play the free Starfield. I wonder if the card may already have been in the other deck, by pure coincidence. It was against one of the Gideons. 

Greg definitely played it once for sure though, the turn after I gave it to him for free.

*edit* I just realized that I didn’t send Starfield over after all, but must have drawn Transcendence from Allure, and it made a 50/50 choice, both being 20 cost. 

Let me see if I discard the gifted Transcendence first, then offer the poison apple Starfield next, if Greg will be thick enough to take a bite. Muahahaha!

*edit 2*

Greg does not know better and will happily cast the free Starfield even if he has a Transcendence waiting in his GY.

Smokincookz

I finally got Transcendence into play under his control. He died soon after. I made a screen capture video of the whole thing, but I’ll have to edit it on my PC and upload later. 

It’s tricky using Daxos and being limited on fetch to get the pieces ready quickly.

But considering this is too slow for PvP anyway, I think Karn could viably use this to KO big bosses. With access to all five colors, it should be much easier to quickly force this nasty card upon poor Greg...

Smokincookz

Here’s a deck for Daxos that can stall Greg while helping get everything ready-

Transcendence
Allure of the Unknown
Starfield of Nyx
Hixus, Prison Warden (typified as “enchantment human soldier” now, enabling Daxos to fetch).
Kaervek, the Spiteful
Black Market
Infinite Obliteration
Hushbringer 
Dark Bargain
Grim Tutor

It is fairly slow, very niche, but you can use Daxos’ 2nd ability to grab the Allure back from GY to send the Transcendence or Starfield over sooner. If you optimize your hand order, you can set it up reasonably fast, considering this is a death sentence after a few turns.

Should be easier to pull off on RotGP/PvE, less defensive stalling needed, just add more draw and fetch instead. 

A Karn deck is to be tested soon as well.

(If this is too much for General Discussion, feel free to move it on over to Deck Strategy & Planeswalker Discussion. That category could use more content. I was super tired when making these posts, it just occurred to me now. Thanks!)

Smokincookz

Only having PvP opponents to test this on (for now), I made Karn’s deck try to endure the madness of legacy, at least some of the time. I’d like support + creature removal, but the deck barely squeezes into 10 slots as is. Maybe swap out Thassa for something else.
 It’s hard to beat the mana & damage output from Thassa + Urza, without using more than two cards.

For Daxos, Kaervek + Black Market work very well, with the 1st ability to spam a token, fetch enchantments, pump up BM, trigger Morbid, rinse & repeat, all for 4 loyalty. That allows us the other 8 card slots without sacrificing mana gain. 

While testing the Daxos deck, I noticed a small issue- sometimes, Allure of the Unknown would fetch another Starfield or Transcendence, and I would end up giving him another Transcendence instead of Starfield, or vice-a-versa.

Not as big a problem for Daxos, as it’s quite easy to snag another enchantment with his 1st ability.

*EDIT ^ I misread Allure of the Unknown as drawing cards, when it fetches them. I think it is intentional that Starfield and Transcendence share the same base mana cost, a foresight against this combo being done too easily.

The rest is mainly fetch, & the creature slot should be flexible to swap out against Bolas in RotGP.

For Karn:

Transcendence
Allure of the Unknown
Starfield of Nyx

Hixus, Prison Warden

Infinite Obliteration

Talent of the Telepath
Blue Sun’s Zenith

Stitch in Time

Urza, Lord High Artificer

Atris, Oracle of Half-Truths (or Whirlwind of Thought, Vadrok, Apex of Thunder, Primal Amulet, Omen of the Sea, Furious Rise, Narset, Parter of Veils.)

Daxos’ deck could probably use more offensive discard and fetch. A large portion of the slowdown for both decks is waiting for Greg to have room in his hand. The Karn deck needs continued testing, but shows some very promising results so far.

One victory on turn 15, and so far the quickest has been turn 8. Not bad at all. I have a good win rate with this, though you have to think about each move very carefully. With the right opening hand and decision making, you can end it quickly.

Ideally, I have been stacking up Transcendence and/or Starfield in my hand as drawn or fetched, then cast an Allure. It’s easy to tell which card you sent to Greg on the next turn. Unless it happens from BSZ, by which is possible to discard a Starfield from Greg’s hand instead of Transcendence. To avoid this as much as possible, and also to avoid giving Greg anything other than Starfield/Transcendence, I don’t cast BSZ until having at least one of the 20 cost supports in-hand.

Always disable the 2 supports. One mistake and game over. I don’t like casting the Starfield for myself either, haven’t had it happen yet, but Maddening Cacophony is such a beast for Loyalty gain. Or any other library destruction, Greg is going to get Transcendence in our own GY sometimes...

Then, I exile from my hand any copies of whichever of the two I know was sent to Greg, then work on sending the other needed card over, discarding from him if Transcendence. 

Smokincookz

I have proof that on rare(?) occasions, Greg will cast Transcendence. Only seen once, but cast it he did. 

https://imgur.com/a/0AZnbCf

I believe he did it as an extreme last-resort. His HP was almost gone before I could give him a Starfield of Nyx. At only 13 HP, without much left to play, Greg banked on a long shot: beating me before Transcendence could bring his life up to full. So, Greg will not always just hold this card-
if you make him desperate enough, he’ll take the gamble.

He did survive a few more turns, partly because I went a little easy on him, and he exiled a couple of my Kaerveks too- but mostly because the support does offset the damage loss, at first...
The life gains quickly outpaced the damage I dealt, and he croaked at full health.

I wonder how Manu would react to this tomfoolery... I’m having a ton of fun, to say the least!


Most who encounter these decks probably bulldozed them easily, but every so often... I bet Greggers can land the right combo and force Transcendence into your GY, at the very least. 

At worst, he could bring it into play under your control. Unlikely, but still, possible.

Smokincookz

Yep, again, Greg played the Transcendence I gave him voluntarily, when he was at 15 HP. So there is a low-HP condition tied to the card’s AI behavior. Got a video capture of it this time.

Wow, this card is a trip, in and of itself. Appears first to be a joke card, akin to Unglued, or just a bad “last resort” strategy, but upon diving deeper.... man. 

Definitely proves that MTGPQ can be just as complex as paper Magic, even if this is a somewhat extreme example.

Smokincookz

I likely won’t be chasing Sorin Markov the vanguard, but it would DEFINITELY work for the Karn deck listed above. To choose which card to send over, with full control, that would be great. I’ve learned so much since this began, the vanguard could be a huge success with the Karn deck I made. 

It is unfortunate there is no alternate art version of Sorin Markov for Fblthp’s offerings

If anyone has Transcendence, and the other cards in the Karn deck I made, or enough similar ones, check it out, if you like these sorts of decks. It’s all about fetching, hand order, setting it all up just right. 

Now I’ll shut up, so others can discuss if they’d to. I’ll keep on testing these variants on my own, and report back after a good long while. The Daxos deck still needs some work, something to speed it up. I’d say Behold the Beyond might be the key.

Have a safe and fun holiday everyone!

Smokincookz

Ok, I know I said I’d shut up, but before I do, here are some awesome highlights:

Get outta my face, Angel of Destiny!

Never give up!

Bane (err, Daxos) breaks Brokhan’s back.

I need a bigger sample size, but I went 12-1 in TG using Karn. Emrakul loops got me once, but even then, I almost had the win. That was before the deck was optimized with Atris.

I also would like to get a video of Greg casting Transcendence as a low-HP, “final glory” comeback move- but it’s rare to happen. He has to be extremely desperate to do that.

TheHunter

Great video, thanks! I tried getting Greg to play Transcendence yesterday in Role Reversal. Took me 6 games to get him to use it. There is definitely a low HP condition before he plays it, and finally when his Karn got down to 31 hp he dropped three at once and lost a few turns later.

Bil

The New ashiok IS a perfect target for transcendence ... Just dump it in your own graveyard and wait for greg's third ability ... That should be a nice Backlash.