April 26th, 2021
Dream Halls Is a Fun Mistake!
In reference to Dream Halls, Mark Rosewater once said: “The lesson of this card is that the designers have to respect mana cost. Whenever we get around mana cost we have to be extra careful because we’re playing with fire. Dream Halls was just the worst case of us getting burnt.” In his article here, he described the card as not just “broken” but as “bah-roken”! I’m sure all of us Magic players take notice when we hear tell of a broken card, especially if a designer is saying it!
While playing group hug my goal is to effect the way the game is played. I think of myself as a world builder for the table. I want the games I participate in to feel different to people than games without me. Maybe that’s a bit egotistical but my creative side wants to make a mark. A marksquare mark haha! While building decks I imagine crazy board states that allow for all players at the table to have interesting lines of play that are different than other games they have played in the past.
Think for a moment about your local game shop or your local meta if you play online. Who has an impact? Is there a player that stands out in your mind?
In my local game shop I think of Doctor Michael. We have a lot of Michaels so we have to designate by livelihood! He is the type of player that comfortably wears the mantle of archenemy. I have told him in the past that playing against him is like being in a boss battle! As a group hug player I wonder how he can take the heat, but he does and it makes games with him memorable in a very specific way. Almost immediately, the whole table has to react to what he’s doing and I have to play my group hug cards very carefully or he just wins instantly! I started building selective hug decks in response to playing against him. Using cards like Wrong Turn, Pir’s Whim and Scheming Symmetry, so I could help players selectively. So I’d like to think that I’m creating memorable gameplay states in much the same way Doctor Michael does, except maybe in the opposite way haha!
That brings us to Dream Halls! It definitely helps the whole table but can we talk for a minute about how charming it is? It basically allows players to cast any spell by discarding (not even exiling) a spell that shares a color. This thing is incredible in my Muldrotha Grave Hug deck! More on that deck later!
Dream Halls is everything I want in a group hug card. First and foremost it allows me to play my favorite sub game in Magic. I like to look around the table and catalog what I know about the players, the cards they have played so far and what commanders they are using all in an effort to determine which player is going to benefit the most by what I’m about to play. It’s very similar to threat assessment but I find it much more interesting because my goal isn’t to counteract any of the game plans. My goal is to create an environment where any player at the table could win. With Dream Halls this is hard to predict sometimes and I like that it surprises me. Without fail it creates interesting outcomes every time it hits the board. And usually it comes out after I have turbo charged card draw and players have a full grip. It gets really nutty when combined with Tidal Barracuda! Or if you think you’ve hugged the table enough and want to make sure you have a chance to win, Vedalken Orrery or Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir will work nicely in your favor!
Well that’s all for this week! If you wanna chat about Magic look me up on Twitter @marksquare_! I wish you free permanents at the table this week1
-marksquare