Card types, such as snow and legendary, can have subtypes, but they cannot share them with each other. If an instant or sorcery spell deals damage to Tarmogoyf or lowers its toughness, it is put into its owner’s graveyard before state-based actions are performed. Supertypes, like Basic and Legendary, are different from card types, as are subtypes like Goblin or Arcane.
Spell Snare is a legitimate counterspell in both Modern and Legacy, as it can counter Tarmogoyf. Combining Tarmogoyf with spells like Giant Growth or Lava Spike can make it even more formidable. The price of Tarmogoyf has fluctuated over time due to different card types, such as instants and sorceries, which have subtypes like Arcane and Trap, and artifacts and enchantments with Auras and Curses.
Tarmogoyf represents the peak of power/toughness efficiency, and when mutated with, his ability override P/T. It is a phenomenal tempo beater that grows extremely quickly in Modern and Legacy, where fetches, instants, creatures, and sorceries hit the yard all the time. It contains the spells and creatures you know and can summon to fight for you.
In summary, Tarmogoyf is a powerful creature that can be combined with various card types to create a formidable deck. Its price fluctuates over time, but its ability to override P/T remains a key factor in its success.
📹 The King | A History of Tarmogoyf
This video is about the rise and fall of Tarmogoyf, and with it, the golden era of Modern Magic. Support the Foglio Portfoglio 2 …
Does snow count towards Tarmogoyf?
The terms “legendary,” “basic,” and “snow” are supertypes, not card types. In the event that an instant or sorcery spell inflicts damage upon Tarmogoyf or reduces its toughness, the card is then placed in the graveyard of its owner.
Is nethergoyf better than Tarmogoyf?
Nethergoyf, a rare from MH3, is expensive but offers half the mana cost and can be played twice. However, it only counts card types in your graveyard, not your opponent’s. It may regain popularity if used in a Commander deck with changelings or other Lhurgoyfs. Nethergoyf can be likened to a 4 mana Terror of the Peaks that deals damage when entering the battlefield. Time will tell if Nethergoyf can regain its popularity.
What card types count for Tarmogoyf?
The power of Tarmogoyf is contingent upon the total number of card types present in all graveyards. Its toughness is equal to the aforementioned number plus one, inclusive of artifact, creature, enchantment, instant, land, planeswalker, sorcery, and tribal.
Who can counter kindred?
The analysis of 58 205 matches reveals that Ivern, Warwick, Shaco, Taliyah, and Nocturne are the best counters for Kindred Jungle, while Brand, Ekko, Sylas, Sejuani, and Graves are countered by Brand. Kindred Jungle aims to gain stacks, so if you’re on the same side of the map when one spawns, kill the camp to prevent her from obtaining the stack. Dueling her is crucial as she can use her range advantage and Q to kite you. To prevent her from soloing objectives, keep the Dragon warded at all times.
How big can Tarmogoyf get in 2024?
Tarmogoyf, a popular card in midrange decks since 2007, is a 9/10 card type. Midrange decks often use cards like Seal of Fire or Tarfire to quickly dump extra card types into the graveyard. The Tarmogoyf die, which can go up to 6/7, is not likely to get bigger than this. As a seasoned Magic Judge, it is advised against using these dice in competitive paper events. Players often rely on a die to determine the size of a Tarmogoyf on the battlefield, which can cause communication issues and difficult judge scenarios. Therefore, it is best to avoid using the dice altogether and keep checking the size of Goyfs whenever relevant.
Does Arcane count for Tarmogoyf?
Snow is a supertype, while Arcane is a subtype. It should be noted that they are not types; therefore, they do not provide the boost to Tarmogoyf that one might expect. The classification of card types includes the following categories: artifact, creature, enchantment, instant, land, plane, scheme, sorcery, tribal, and vanguard. Some objects exhibit characteristics associated with multiple card types, combining aspects of each and susceptible to spells and abilities that affect them.
Is Kindred a card type?
The Magic: The Gathering card set comprises a variety of card types, including artifact, battle, conspiracy, creature, dungeon, enchantment, instant, kindred, land, phenomenon, plane, planeswalker, scheme, sorcery, and vanguard. In some cases, a single object may possess multiple card types. For instance, an artifact creature may be both an artifact and a creature. The designation of a card’s type is a characteristic inherent to every card and serves to delineate the parameters governing its playability.
Why does the Nest go to eco?
The Google Nest thermostat can automatically switch to Eco Temperatures when it senses no one’s home, displaying “ECO” on the thermostat and in the Nest or Google Home app. You can also set Eco Temperatures when you’re at home to save energy. The Home app for Nest Learning Thermostat (4th gen) displays “Auto-Eco” if no one’s home, “Eco hold” if you manually selected your Eco Temperature preset, or “Adaptive Eco” if you activated the Adaptive Eco setting. The thermostat will always switch out of Eco Temperatures at the next scheduled temperature change.
Does Kindred count for Tarmogoyf?
Previously published versions of the card in question referenced the “tribal” designation in their accompanying reminder text. However, the name has since been modified to “kindred,” which does not impact the functional capabilities of the aforementioned cards.
Does Tarmogoyf count kindred?
The designation of a specific card type has been modified to “kindred.” This alteration does not impact the functional capabilities of the aforementioned cards or Tarmogoyf. It should be noted that earlier printings did not reference the “battle” card type. Nevertheless, Tarmogoyf’s ability still applies to that specific type.
Does Urza’s saga count as a land?
Urza’s Saga is a land-based game, and as such, its gameplay must be conducted in accordance with the established rules and conventions.
📹 The Token Worth More Than Tarmogoyf | #MTG #shorts
What a world… Today’s video is brought to you by Card Kingdom. You can pick up some Magic: the Gathering cards (and help …
In Finland we used to call Tarmogoyf centric decks “Tarmon valinta” (meaning Tarmo’s pick/choice) based on an old Finnish food market franchise with the same name. The idea being, like a shopkeeper retails a bunch of stuff just to grow the business, you’d slap a bunch of cards in to play just to grow the goyf.
A few fun facts: Fun facts: – My first ever GP was Montreal TS block constructed where Tarmogoyf got its first result. – Your footage of PT Philadelphia (first Modern PT) shows me when I was 19 (grey shirt, white collar no beard). – The pro tour you reference as PT eldrazi is where I made my first PT Top 8. The plot thickens.
I think one of the most interesting things about tarmogoyf is that it could legitimately be printed into a standard set without worry about warping standard around it (given just how good creatures on average are nowadays). Like, sure, it would likely end up seeing play if they did that, but unless the enablers of goyf were completely free, chances are most decks would just have better things to do. Goyf largely scales with a format, almost always “one of the best 2 drop creatures” but rarely more than just an efficient beatstick.
I started playing just before Modern became a format. I didn’t understand why Tarmogoyf was so popular, or even what it was for a long time. The more I play Magic though, the more I feel like Tarmogoyf embodies what drew me to Magic in the first place. It’s a potentially big body, sure, but it has interaction with other cards and the graveyard, and that’s what makes Magic great to me. That makes it more interesting than just a 4/5 for 2. Or wait, is it a 5/6?
It’s so nice getting to see my boy on the big screen. As a kid I always dreamed of owning Tarmogoyfs I just loved it so much. Now as an adult I don’t know what is harder to believe, that I own 4 or that they are now somewhat mediocre cards. I’d love to see a return to Goyf, maybe in pioneer one day. That being said I always smile when I cast it.
Fuck me, I was not ready for a MtG article to make me this upset. I never cast Goyf, but played against it countless times with Twin, Scapeshift, Humans and it’s truly an icon. These times were the times I was most invested in playing, perusal pro tournaments etc… To think that is all gone and changed now is just so sad.
Excellent article as always. You give me the feeling of longing and nostalgia for an era of Magic that I wasn’t even a part of and was probably too young to be anyway. As sad as it is to feel like I only joined the game once it had already hit its decline, articles like yours give me hope that we can recapture the magic of Magic again…
Ithink the best thing about goyf is that…. it hasnt actually been printed. Its printed in future sight as a future sight print (a preprint, if you will) and a bunch of printings in reprint sets. I mean I know technically future sight printing is a printing, but theme-vise, it hasnt been printed yet. Just reprints of a preprint
What a blast from the past. This modern format was the peak of MTG imo and the better years I had with this game. I remember perusal Modern streams in my old apartment and meeting with friends at the LGS for the weekly Modern tournament. I strongly relate to what you say at 34:11 and this is what ultimately drove me away from MTG.
It really is a damn shame what’s happened to Modern as a format and competitive Magic as a whole. Between MH2, the end of general support for the competitive game, and Pioneer, WotC has really kneecapped what used to be an iconic format. Legacy’s even deader in the water. I have hope that Modern can rise from the ashes, but with the general direction of the game I fear that’s not possible.
This was quite a ride to watch. I am feeling a lot of emotions, and also wondering if my days of Magic are fading into obscurity as well. I still have my OG 4 goyfs I acquired to play TarmoRack in Standard back in 2007. Those 4 pieces of cardstock have played so many games. Thank you for your deft touch. I am almost tearing up.
I remember this game store near me that has been closed for a while now. Id go to their rival store, but I remember searching for an Emrakul, the Promised End and a Liliana, the Last Hope after Eldritch Moon came out. This store was the only place near me to have them. I remember seeing a foil Tarmogoyf hanging from the fridge in the store. I remember being astounded seeing it, just because it wasnt behind glass. I asked the owner, “arent you worried about someone stealing the goyf” and he laughed and said “hey, if they steal it, they need it more than I do!” I got started in Magic around Innistrad, but Return to Ravnica is the time I most fondly remember pro magic. The magic economy was booming, the pro scene was amazing, and the hype for new sets was real, but the card I remember most was Tarmogoyf. Thinking of picking up a playset since theyre so cheap, plus one Future Sight version and one MM15 foil copy.
When Future Sight came out, my testing team cracked the Dredge deck right away. Keep in mind, dredge was legal in STANDARD here – this was the first time anybody was seeing Narcomoeba and Bridge from Below here. Anyway, we were trying to figure out how to beat targeted graveyard hard. And that’s when someone suggested… What about Tarmogoyf? I tried 4 copies in my sideboard – “Wow, this is such a good beater!” I ended up trading various random cards for a grand total of 16 copies of Tarmogoyf – I’d get them as throw-ins. I figured my future sideboards might need them. Over the years, I’ve traded some away. A couple friends still have some of mine. A few were even swiped, cards I lent someone and never returned. But I still keep my playset of four Future Sight, slightly chipped at the corners from play Tarmogoyfs. It’s a card synonymous with competitive Magic to me. Thank you for making a article about it. Excellent stuff.
This article hit me hard. I started playing magic in 2015. I remember GP vegas, Modern Masters 1, Eldrazi winter. I feel the death of professional magic and the death of modern hard. I used to love how modern rewarded having a deck you loved and piloting it with experience, sometimes even more than what the actual deck was. Makes me weep internally now
I very much enjoy your articles. They are extremely well made, well researched, and compelling! It is obvious how much work you put into them. Please keep it up. Pertaining to Tarmogoyf’s price jump after Modern Masters 2013, I have a bit to add. I was at GP Vegas in 2013, which was the only Modern Masters 2013 sealed major event. I remember that near the end of the day Sunday, Star City Games shocked the event. All weekend Goyf was selling for 100-105.00 USD. Late Sunday afternoon, Star City set it’s buy price at 110.00 USD, higher than the sell price of all the other vendors, and gobbled up as many Goyfs as they could. Within a week, Goyf was 150.00. The market price was raised deliberately, IMHO. Call that whatever you like, but that is what I remember from the time, with a front row seat.
I grew up with the game, and Time Spiral is my favorite block of all time. I love the history of both the fictional world of Dominaria and the printed Magic sets which were created before the modern card frames and modern plane-jumping release schedule came into effect. But I’ve always hated the concepts of sideboards and metagame grinding & study, and have never paid the slightest bit of attention to the sanctioned competitive formats. So thanks for the enlightening look at this facet of the game which has a rich history all its own. It’s fascinating how this card seems to have been conceived as a bizarre novelty intended for a niche audience who loves odd build-around challenges, and instead accidentally became a hyper-efficient, format defining threat. Even more remarkably, despite the status as a way-too-expensive mistake, people seemed genuinely fond of the thing instead of resenting it. Definitely one of the most storyworthy cards ever printed.
3:57 I can confirm this as a contemporary player, who at that time did like to buy cards from Ebay. But only cheap kitchen table stuff, so a playset of Glimmervoid for 10 bucks were deemed too expensive. A playset of Tarmogoyf was considerably cheaper. But alas, I wasn’t a fan of the Future Sight design, so I did not buy them when they could literally be had for a few bucks.
I have a draft story for y’all, back in the days of Theros Beyond Death I was once passed Uro, Titan of Natures Wrath. This was before Uro was banned so he was worth like some 50 bucks or so. I asked the guy that passed the pack if he passed the wrong pile by mistake, his response was simply “I hate blue” fucking legend, the whole table just had this look on, it was a mix of shock and respect, I will never forget that moment as long as I live.
I was in the very first Ultimate Masters draft my local shop held. Everyone in the draft was there to try and get a Tarmogoyf. I had saved up a fair bit of money so I could try and run more then one draft. Anyway, the first draft was a dud. No one pulled anything good. So this one guy in the shop walks up to the front counter and buys a single pack from the box we had drafted. Of course, as luck or chance would have it, he pulled a full art Tarmogoyf.
Fun Fact: I used to play Tarmogoyf as an artifact-hate-proof backup threat in my modern ravager/affinity deck back in 2015/2016. I saw a spicy list that topped a japanese PTQ from an innovative player who also ran 4 shrapnel blasts to quickly kill ppl with goyf. That deck really lost to spell snare, but it was so fun to equip cranial plating to the “Goofy”, as the Goyf is often called here in Austria 😅 needless to say, Tarmogoat is hands-down the best vanilla monster of all time – Kird Ape had his run, but Goyf really upped the stakes 💪🏻 also, I think she’s probably a female looking to get some food for her Tarmogirls
I remember hearing about the Goyf draft pick and frankly, I personally don’t see an issue with that pick. Yeah, it may not be good for the deck, but also, that is an expensive card. It’s just good for sight in my opinion. Cause either trade, sell or use, it is something you can use. Also, he can choose any card he wants. No rule against that.
I have only ever played Yu-Gi-Oh, I have loved that game since perusal it as a kid, obviously old now. I’m not here to be rude or rustle any feathers. Simply to say, before clicking this article, I was well aware of this absolute unit and out of respect for the King, I’m getting my robe and wizard hat so I can learn a thing or two.
I like these articles, but as someone who doesn’t play much constructed I would really appreciate some more full card images displayed on screen when namedropping cards and combos, even just as a brief pop up on the side of the screen. Helps people who don’t know the card, people who would benefit from a quick refresh and just generally as a visual aid to the article without taking away anything from people who already know the card. Cheers
What’s funny is I used to read “Lotus Noir” basically “Black Lotus” in french, it was a french magazine dedicated to mtg and it had an article on Goyf when it released, they nailed it straight on, stating the card was busted at any state of the game, so I kept the one I had open in future sight, still have it to this day I like all of your articles, but I don’t like the bitter ending of this one, we shouldn’t view the end of Goyf runtime as the end of “fair Magic”, fair Magic never existed, the first set was a mix of trash and busted beyond belief cards, the formats are evolving, new ones are made, but it’s always been the case, and it’s what makes the beauty of MTG, you can still enjoy it and discover new ways to play to this date, the history of Goyf is still existing, and its legacy lives on with articles like this At the end, it’s a game of cycles, and we will look back on 2022 formats in 2027 stating they were far better, because we like to be nostalgic, but the truth is, if the game didn’t power crept, didn’t evolve through the years, it would have been extremely stale, boring, and Goyf would never have seen the printer, R&D would be an empty place, and players wouldn’t even play the game anymore Not every change is good, but the change is a good thing, I hope everyone reading this monologue can enjoy the game in it’s own way, you deserve to have fun
The story of Tarmogoyf actually makes me kinda sad. The decline of Goyf, Modern, and the Pro Tour is the decline of what I loved about Magic. I recently got back in after a 2yr hiatus. I still have fun, but I really miss the 2013-2016 era. Which might has some to do with where I was in life back then as well.
I still remember the first time I saw a Tarmogoyf previewed, and I was only smitten with the card because it said “Planeswalker” on it. Little did I know that later, it would be the most expensive Magic card I can name off the top of my head. Now, I’m just happy to own a playset of history, even if it’s from a bygone era.
I wasn’t a Modern player, but I will always honor the King. I love this game’s history, how individual cards became more than just cardboard, how much it matters to us as a community that we remember the glory days even as they fade into WotC’s relentless money pit. I don’t think we’re going to have another Tarmogoyf, or a Siege Rhino, or a Gifts Ungiven, because these things are considered mistakes by WotC even as they’re adored by the community. It feels like they don’t care like they used to. That’s a shame, in my eyes. Maybe that’s how it had to become to keep the company profitable. I’ll always miss when a two mana creature that gets big was enough to signpost a format.
Episodes about capital C Cards, are the best ones. I built a Jund deck recently with the goyf for the first time and it’s exactly the feelings that this article describes. It IS fair magic. It IS a fun card period. Playing tarmogoyf on turn two is that same indescribable feeling as assembling urzatron for the first time, or casting jace the mindsculptor. It’s special 🙂
I love how there are tons of comments from people decrying this supposed “fall of Modern”, and how, “They miss fair Magic”… Like what in the HELL are you people talking about?!?! Just bc Tarmogoyf is a relatively “fair” MTG card, that in NO WAY represents the former state of Modern as it once was. How quickly you all seem to have forgotten that when Modern was created it premiered with a Ban List consisting of essentially any Blue card of note, or worth playing. From what I can recall, Wizards fundamentally neutered control as a viable archetype, and in its stead we got a slew of annoying and unexciting combo decks. It’s only in the past 2-3 years that the format has finally returned to a place where control has even been allowed to EXIST, and if you don’t count the UR Expressive Iteration decks (which I don’t, as they’re more tempo-focused aggro decks, w/ control elements) there’s basically a good UW control deck…and that’s it. Now, one is better than none, and it’s a great deck, but still. We’re currently experiencing a highpoint in Modern’s history, where it’s not just a slew of combo decks and slower-than-control-even midrange grind fest decks, but efficient aggro decks and a comeback of control. Modern, imo, is only really just now worth playing for the first time in its entire history.
u say tarmogoyf was the most prestine priced normal card that held its price for so long. “Did you ever hear the tragedy of Imperial Seal, the expensive one?” “No.” “I thought not. It’s not a story the investors would tell you. It’s a MtG legend. Imperial Seal… was a Portal Three Kingdoms card, so powerful and so scarce, that it became a very expensive card. Over 20 years it had become so iconic and asked for… that it would climb the throne as… the most expensive non-Reserved-List card in MtGs history.” “It could actually acquire substantial financial value even though it was not on the Reserved List?” “Products from before 2000, created especially for the Chinese market… are a pathway to many card prices… some consider to be unnatural” “Wh– What happened to it?” “It became so expensive, the only thing it was afraid of was… losing its exclusivity. Which eventually, of course, it did. Unfortunately, Imperial Seal never made it on the Reserved List. So WotC decided to reprint it in 2XM 2… it’s ironic. It was the key example showing that non-Reserved-List card could be as expensive as those on the Reserved List because of rarity, but in the end it was repronted just like Imperial Recruiter and Grim Tutor.” “Is it possible to get on the Reserved List” “Not anymore.”
Holy shit. I’m one minute in, and you’re wrong. Finland LITERALLY is not culturally scandinavian. Finnish mythology has nothing to do with norse mythology – though it’s equally ingrained into fantasy, through Tolkien’s inspiration by it (Tolkien’s elves basically speak a fictional proto-finnish, btw).
People talk about the competitive ethics of picking burst lightning over tarmogoyf in Pascal Maynard’s situation. Let’s talk a little bit about the neal-life ethics for a bit. In this situation, you have to choose between a $1000 dollar card, and a useful card. Or in other words, you have to pay $1000 dollars to add a useful card to your deck. In what fucking UNIVERSE is it fair to allow rich players to pay money to add an extra useful card to their sealed deck? How can a dilema on the value of a card ever be rightfully judged as ethical or not, when the only people who could ever be permitted to make that judgement are the kinds of people who can afford to piss away $1000 for a competitive edge?! For the kinds of people who can afford an $800 tarmogoyf playset?! You cannot make ANY statements on ethics in competetive Magic, when the best player who ever lived might be some guy playing on kitchen tables who could never afford a competitive deck, and we would never know. It’s infuriating to me that people would dare make judgements on greed or ethics in a situation that’s all WotC’s fault! They allowed card prices to fluctuate so wildly! They’re the ones who printed 50 cent burst lightnings next to thousand dollar tarmogoyfs, and that would have no effect on the competitive landscape or both sealed and constructed.
I still remember opening a foil Goyf at the prerelease and like a month later trading it for some bad rares and a foil Teferi. I was a little boy and checking prices online wasn’t that common. Maybe one day I would buy a foil Goyf and never let it go, but it won’t be the same Goyf :’) but now that it’s cheap, I’m happy.
They way you tell stories is just absolutely astounding. They way you cast a spell on all of the long time players, new players, and people who don’t even play this game. Whether it be nostalgia of the love, fear, or perhaps both, for this card can be felt here. I too dream of days of the king. I have 4 foil’s sitting in my binder just waiting for the day. What doesn’t grow, dies right? Same can be said for us as people. I hope that we all keep growing like Tarmogoyf. I hope that we all never stop playing this game, smiling as we cast our favorite spells, and laugh with friends as we steal wins out of nowhere. What is Magic if not for the gathering? Each one of your articles remind us of that. And this one is no exception. Long live the King. ♥
I gave up magic in 2018 when me and my play group dispersed, and coming back to see all the classic modern staples truly die takes my breath away. I never would have though I’d see the spinach monster himself truly die But seeing all my old decks in tapped out become suddenly cheap definitely made me splurge on some decks I had been meaning to make for a long time lol
I remember buying a box of modern masters 2017, drafting it with my freinds but I’d keep the cards. One of my friends opened it and said “what does / mean?” I got so excited, and sold it for about 100 dollars, becuase I wasn’t going to play competitive formats and that was way too much for a single card! Half a decade later, I finally bought one for my cube, for 17 dollars, two weeks before this article came out.
Tarmogoyf never fails to make me think “Heck yeah am I glad I immediately recognized it as a good card”, but this article made me take a step back and think about how I did it. Luckily, my posts from 15 years ago are still online (and yes, reading them is a chilling experience), and my logic was very straightforward: pretty much every deck runs at least creatures, instants and sorceries, making it at least a 3/4 for 2, before you even take the other card types into account (with Bound in Silence not having been previewed yet at the time – yes, Future Sight did have a Tribal card). Since Magic of 2007 was still a world of Watchwolves, Kird Apes and Loxodon Hierarchs to me, a complete casual who liked giving flying to Scaled Wurms, the card’s stats was a good enough reason for me to believe a card to be good (with a caveat that you might not want to treat it as an early drop) – and sure enough, the stats do an excellent job all on their own. Sometimes, it really is that simple.
I’ve watched this article so many times, I love EVERY article on this website. I wish I was clever enough to make a pun or dad joke about the website thing because I love that card and have been casting it since I’ve been 10. I just wanted to point out… THAT BLOOD MOON! WHY IS NOBODY MENTIONING THAT BLOOD MOON ENOUGH LIKE IT DIDN’T WIN THE GAME!?
Legacy still plays it. Canadian threshold, some builds of temur delver with the mongoose and goyfs. And I love to play it in bug sylvan library shells. The Japanese reprint with foil future sight frame and modern master art is very expensive, but more of a manufactured price other than actual product value. I’m happy I own a playset and I am happy I also own the foil lurgoyf? It’s just a feel good card❤
Tarmogoyf won me a spot in the ProTour after spiking Modern a GP back in 2019. I will always love this card, but I quit playing a few years ago after realizing WotC’s new design philosophy was killing the game that I loved so much. I’m glad I did, because at least I could sell my honest cards for a good price.
Honestly, I never got HATE that Pascal Maynard received for drafting the Tarmogoyf. Ok, yes, it was a more enticing pick because of the value of the card. If any other player would have done it or if such pick was done without a camera present, then there would be no issue to begin with. Only an idiot would pass up a FOIL GOYF, let’s not kid ourselves. But now let’s talk about the hate he got for “Selling out” or doing something that is “Against the integrity of the game and being a Professional Player”. In the limited format, Tarmogoyf is a bomb that can’t easily be answered. So basically, in a competitive perspective, he was actually Hate Drafting, so that he won’t need to face a Tarmogoyf from the other side of the table. It was only ironic that the Burst Lightning that he passed up on was used against him, but screw that, Pascal made sure that he wasn’t facing a 4/5 Goyf in the Top 8. Yes, I know, he picked the FOIL GOYF because of its value. But is that crime? Is it illegal? Is it immoral? ABSOLUTELY NOT. “Against the integrity of the game” my ass. The ethics of the game is only found in the rules of the game. If you break a rule then that’s what’s “Unethical” in the context of the game. “Ethics”, really? Yes, I know that this issue has long been put to rest, but no person should have received that much hate from the community. Gosh, these are just cards.
Evan Erwin, or “Mr. Orange” of The Magic Show fame, summed up Tarmogoyf pretty well once it had established itself in Standard at the time. In response to the argument that it was a bad vanilla beater that dies to everything. he said: “Yes, but if you don’t have what Tarmogoyf dies to, you die !” And that has remained ever true, even against pushed removal like Fatal Push. We all love to scoff at that “boring” vanilla 4/5, but if you don’t have what kills it, you’ll die to that same boring vanilla 5/6 rather quickly.
33:26 Marketing value… Unless it’s Commander nothing has marketing value for Hasbro/Wizards. They completely demolished Collector Boosters for Dominaria United for the sake of Commander. All remaining sets of 2022 will probably have the same downside/problem; to many cards for Commander. Which is odd, because Hasbro/Wizards wants everybody to play Magic Arena, but Commander isn’t on it yet all their product is so hard focused on that format you would almost think Standard, Modern, Legacy are all just side effects of ink being pressed onto cardboard.
Id like to share a personal story of Tarmogoyf. When the card was first printed i fell inlove. trading for and buying each and every copy i saw. I ended up with 7 in total. 4 foil 3 non foil. I sold the 3 non foil to fund another deck i was building at the time. Fast forward to 2020 i was engaged to an amazing person only to find out i no longer loved them, the relationship grew toxic and i decided to end it. I moved back home but left most of my stuff there. So after a few months i asked them to send back my magic stuff. and after a few days i got it in the mail. everything was there, but everycard in my binder was cut in two. my foil Tarmogoyfs that i was planning on selling to put a downpayment on an apartment, ruined.
Tarmogoyf is one of my all-time favorite cards solely for its Modern Masters art. It’s just expertly crafted. I also love the card, but that 2nd, new commissioned art is what made it a instant favorite. I remember lamenting for so long that I could never own a copy, $200 for one was far beyond what I wanted to spend for a single card….eventually after a long time, I think I slowly picked up 3 copies when it dropped to $60ish and didn’t think it get any lower. It of course has dropped, but I’m happy with my copies and gotten a lot of joy and games out of them Goyfs and it’ll never leave my collection or heart as a big favorite of mine!
Time Spiral block was such a high point for Magic design. Not every card was good, in fact a lot of them were fiddly and terrible, but every single card was interesting. Compared to now, when sets are generally piles of role-players and bulk with a few obviously pushed powerhouses splashed in, Time Spiral block is still mind-blowing in just how adventurous it was.
Just like Goyf, you’re content is reliably amazing, Sam, thank you. I always think for new players, understanding Goyf is where you really begin to understand Magic better. Even playing against a Goyf or playing with it is where a beginning player will really break out from that beginner stigma. By no means do you need Goyf to go beyond beginner, but it really does help.
I, a new player to mtg (1.5 years at this point?) never realized just how big tarmogoyf was…. Like, i knew he was a really popular creature and was great is modern. Besides that, I didn’t even realize how valuable he was at his peak. Here I was thinking it was like an 80$ card not realizing it was reaching highs of 200-300$… wth…
Wonderful article, as always. This was a super interesting one to watch, because a lot of the relevant points happened at times when I had taken breaks from playing Magic. I remember my first brush with Tarmogoyf was in a Modern Masters draft. Someone freaked out about cracking one and I remember thinking, “Really? That card from Future Sight? Isn’t it just a vanilla creature?” Funny how you can miss tectonic shifts when you take breaks.
It’s funny but the one thing I take away from this article is that Modern just doesn’t feel like Modern anymore because Goyf is not really there. I feel like Modern should just end instead of morphing into this thing that it is today with Modern Horizons obliterating the format, much in the same way that Extended gave way to Modern. Maybe Modern should just live on as a 15 year (2003-2018) format in the same way that Premodern predates it (as technically a decade long format). Call it the Silver Age of Magic.
The notion that taking a foil goyf is somehow immoral is idiotic. In a draft, you don’t just draft to make a good deck: you draft to make a better deck than everyone else, one that will beat their decks. Picking the goyf isn’t a sub-optimal move: it’s THE optimal move, because you’re also DENYING another player the most powerful card at the time.
Truly a special card. I got into competitive Magic because I loved the simple yet elegant designs of Tarmogoyf and Lightning Bolt by buying into Dickmann’s tarmotwin. When Twin was banned I moved to Jund and kept the goyfs and bolts. The original goyfs I played with in 2015 are still sitting in a binder today. I hope one day they’ll have a chance to shine again.
I always find it amazing that you can make me have the “feels” about a card I never played. I played Magic in the 90s, quit, and got back in during Eldritch Moon. Tarmogoyf being one of the reasons I felt I couldn’t afford to play Modern, the fetchlands too. I have fallen on tougher financial times since then so Modern is still not an option, though I kinda want a play set of these just because.
As someone who was reintroduced to Magic through commander my first thought looking at Tarmogoyf was “how do you get it through?” Then I started to really miss the simplicity of 60 card magic. Of course 60 card decks can be absurdly complicated but what I was really missing was the feeling of a good efficient creature being enough to win you a game instead of some high powered and game breaking contraption that commander decks usually rely on these days. I think what I miss most about it is flavor. A really strong monster SHOULD be enough on it’s own to beat your opponent. That kind of thing makes sense when you try to visualize what’s happening flavor-wise in a Magic game. It can be hard to even make sense of what a late game commander board state would look like if you tried to imagine it literally. Come to think of it, I miss simplicity in commander too. Power creep is really disheartening.
I was a teenager at the time of Future Sight and was mainly buying singles for playing tournaments on a budget. Tarmogoyf basically made me quit the game. By the time I realised how powerful tarmogoyf was, the card had already hit prices on the secondary market that were beyond my reach. With no tarmogoyf in my possession, I found myself basically excluded from competitive play (at least from T1.x tournaments). Not to mention tarmo’s ubiquity made the game quite boring; even affinity decks splashed green for tarmo at some point… the power of this card was just ridiculous.
a short while back i became jaded again, convinced YouTube must be the sole factor ruining my life. per usual, i panicked, pruning subscriptions until arriving at 30. you were one of the websites i kept, exactly for a point you made clear at the end of this article: you are the Tarmogoyf, the Lightning Bolt, the two-blue Counterspell of capturing the essence that makes Magic Magic with elegance and alacrity and tact. it’s article like yours that make me grateful the platform exists. the diligent mastery with which you act as a historian for this community, documenting our stories and kings, is witnessed, definite, and prized.
34:12 I find this characterization a bit unfair. Modern fell out of favour precisely because it is no longer accessible, and Tarmogoyf being $200 a piece definitely isn’t helping. As someone who tried to get into modern during its “Golden Age” because my friends were playing it, it was simply impractical because of how prohibitively expensive some of the cards are, including, again, the Goyf itself. The introduction of formats like Pioneer and Historic was a godsend and not lacking “general appeal” for me at all. They were infinitely more appealing than modern because they were infinitely cheaper.
In response to Pascal Maynard decision. everyone who did him wrong because he picked money over the game and then clapped when he sold the card and donated to charity are all snakes. Even if everyone admitted that they would’ve done the same and supported his pick because “dude, its a foil Goyf during the stardom of this card in Modern Masters.” The fact that there were “moralists” taking every turn to shame people for selfish needs in an occupation that is already un-stable in income and such, should all be paddled. Pascal Maynard *became* the bigger man ONLY because he KNEW he had to give into social pressures. Anyone blind to this contributes to it like how Goyf just grows with every addition to the GY. He had to trade his victory (for picking the wrong card) and then sell that exact card to applease the mob.
It’s not on Pascal or any specific player’s integrity, Wizards pays attention to the secondary market, otherwise they would’ve put Goyf in $4 boosters. (But that’s a whole other can of worms) If anyone else had to choose and they didn’t take it, financially, they’re dumb or crazy. And if they did take it, they’re a hypocrite. Let the man have his fun lol.
2:52 what a banger background track (when to Stop by Lofive), couldn’t focus on the commentary with that one blasting in the background, thanks for putting your background music in the description! somehow that is not the standard, I guess it is due to the UMG mafia capping anyone using copyrighted music
Hearing you talk about modern’s complete and utter erosion really echos the sentiment I hear from a lot of the most established Modern players I know. In a way, for those who got into playing or perusal magic primarily via the context of modern (Pre or Post Twin Ban, doesn’t really matter), old modern is basically what legacy was to the older crowd of Magic. It was a place of highly skill testing decks and interesting metagame calls to figure out how to win an event any given Sunday. I look at the post MH1 Jund lists and am delighted with how, despite the new cards… it still felt like Jund. Nowadays I wonder if we’ll ever get back to modern as how it was. But we’ll always have those memories I suppose.
We made a Time Spiral Remastered draft some months ago and one of my friends opened a foil Tarmogoyf. We absolutly lost it. We havent chequed prices since 2010 from the goyf and we thought it was like 400 euros but then we looked it up and saw its price gone down and we did a research of why it wasn’t played that much. This article sums it up very well. Neverthelss, as you said, it’s always a joy to open one of them!
Pascal’s Wager: Goyf is picked, or Goyf is not. Reason cannot decide between the two alternatives. A game is being played, where heads or tails will turn up. you must wager (it is not optional). Let us weigh the gain and the loss in taking the Goyf. Let us estimate these two chances. If you gain, you gain Goyf; if you lose, you lose nothing. Wager, then, without hesitation, on Goyf. There is here an infinity of infinitely happy life to gain, a chance of gain against a finite number of chances of loss, and what you stake is finite. And so our proposition is of infinite force when there is the finite to stake in a game where there are equal risks of gain and of loss, and the Goyf to gain. But some cannot take the Goyf. They should then ‘at least learn the market price of Goyf…’ and ‘Endeavour then to convince’ themselves.
I started during time spiral and quit during the same time after losing to 100 sacred mesa tokens. Didn’t play again until I met my cousin again and found out they played, and starter playing mtg again at the end of shards of Alara, and the start of zendikar. If I had played the years I missed, I would have had a lot of expensive cards,and probably won some tournaments(based on how Good I got after coming back,but that’s hindsight, and I had experience playing other types of games,which made mtg even easier to figure out)
Your ability to communicate the feeling of nostalgia and the sense of the past is truly amazing, I started magic in the tarkir block, and by the time I reached out from my small group of highschool friends and no format, table magic modern was already a sea of hyper tuned cheap cmc decks whose average game turn count kept going down. I never experienced the time of the goyf, but I still felt like I was perusal someone talk about the first time I zerod a life total with a burn spell. The first a deck clicked.
I was playing Magic competitively during this era. I remember a seller opened a bunch of Future Sight boxes when Tarmogoyf was still a dollar card. He had a thick bunch of it. He sold all of them for cheap as it was considered a crap rare then. A week later, its price shot up. Easily the biggest regret of his life he said.
I’m a 34 yr old magic player, I don’t play as much as I did years ago. I wanted to play modern however I was hampered by my wallet. I played standard and commander. I yearned for a playset of goyfs. The modern format seemed so interesting to me back then. Now that I can afford the goyfs, I don’t buy them. Modern has changed. I want to play in the goyf glory days. But those days have passed. If modern magic is indeed dying, then just maybe that death… will feed the tarmogoyf.
I never played with tarmogoyf until its “reprint” for historic on magic arena. As a pod player, I lost to many a tarmogoyf, but it never felt bad. Maybe liliana, slaughter pact or a sideboarded natures claim made me angry, but tarmo is just a big goofy guy. Cant be mad at him Man, i miss modern being fun
I remember one modern championship at a local game store that I won with a burn deck. One match I opened with 3 Goblin Guides in my hand and the victory was obvious. This way with few years of experience in the game I got the first place against more experienced players. I guess that the feelin is bout the same when talkin about 3 goyfs in the opening hand.