GregLombardi
Member
I am not playing standard while copycat exists without sufficient answers, unless I play copycat myself. So I just grabbed Saheeli on Ebay.
So dumb!
So dumb!
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Magic: the Gathering |OT10| Aether Revolt - That shit that make your Soul Burn slow
- Thread starter SigmasonicX
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Angry Grimace
Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
I mean, you can always just draft or play limited until Amonkhet comes out.
Infinite Stars
Member
Because it is stuck in the Shitter. In what world is "Oh, it's good for Sideboard" anything close to balanced colorwise? Two of the most sideboarded "white" cards can be cast/enter play without even using White Mana.
No one builds a modern deck and goes "Hey, I should add White because of the sideboard!", which is the excuse everyone gives for White being shit. There's multiple reasons to go Black, Green, Red or even Blue (Snapcaster/Cryptic/Ancestral) in the main board. White has Path, which is basically it.
Angry Grimace
Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
Modern is a sideboard-focused format.
Familienoberhauptvogel
Banned
Not really one team of European pros thought they had something and posted positive results, getting 2 of them into the top 16.
That's like arguing BR Eldrazi is a rising deck after last weekend.
DSJ stretches their mana even thinner than it already is to add white and not for path.
Draft 3-4 color Planeswalkers.
Baffled that neither Oath of Nissa or Oath of Ajani are in the cube though.
charlequin
Banned
lol jackassery
This is going to have the exact opposite of the effect they are hoping it will have.
They're completely right about Modern tho.
This is going to have the exact opposite of the effect they are hoping it will have.
They're completely right about Modern tho.
Angry Grimace
Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
Modern Masters is going to be out literally on Friday
I think they knew what had to be done, but they probably figured they'd rather suck up the "bad optics" until after 2 weeks of Amonkhet spoilers to temper the "bad news" with "good news." In some senses, I get that - the format is basically over and you probably can get away with just sucking up changes until people would have to change their decks anyways.
Infinite Stars
Member
Death Shadow Jund runs White because Ranger of EOS gets them Two Death Shadows. They're not running White beyond Ranger being a good tutor.
I'm not saying Modern isn't in a good spot, but it could be better. Granted, I'm well aware complaining about modern with Standard right now is like complaining "My Thumb hurts" when the guy next to you has his leg cut off.
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/format-staples/modern/full/all
Of particular note:
Relic of Progenitus is played more then Rest in Peace, despite both being largely sideboard options. If White was truly the "best Sideboard color", we'd not see RiP be below Relic because more people would play White.
From the rest of that list, the only other two sideboard options are Blessed Alliance and Stony Silence. Souls is a gold card, Displacer is Colorless, both of which are Maindeck cards. Path is the most played card, but that's basically it for white in terms of Maindeck cards.
So if White isn't the best Sideboard color(which it isn't, because Stony Silence is the only white card ranked above it's counterparts) and it is absolutely pisspoor in the main board(Path vs everything else that's Maindeck in other colors), then what is White good for in Modern?
I'm not saying Modern isn't in a good spot, but it could be better. Granted, I'm well aware complaining about modern with Standard right now is like complaining "My Thumb hurts" when the guy next to you has his leg cut off.
My point is, even in a Sideboard focused format the best Sideboard color barely sees play. Here's a list of the top 50 cards that see play in Modern
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/format-staples/modern/full/all
Of particular note:
Relic of Progenitus is played more then Rest in Peace, despite both being largely sideboard options. If White was truly the "best Sideboard color", we'd not see RiP be below Relic because more people would play White.
From the rest of that list, the only other two sideboard options are Blessed Alliance and Stony Silence. Souls is a gold card, Displacer is Colorless, both of which are Maindeck cards. Path is the most played card, but that's basically it for white in terms of Maindeck cards.
So if White isn't the best Sideboard color(which it isn't, because Stony Silence is the only white card ranked above it's counterparts) and it is absolutely pisspoor in the main board(Path vs everything else that's Maindeck in other colors), then what is White good for in Modern?
charlequin
Banned
i lol'd
I guess my two issues with this strategy are: one, why do you want your entire hype cycle for the next set weighed down by people shitting on it because they're bitter about the current competitive cycle? And two, if they're going to treat every Standard environment as "basically over" by this point in the cycle, why even bother adding a second announcement? Under the old system everyone would have already accepted that this season was thrown in the trash, but now people have to worry that they're going to do something even dumber like let Copycat stick around for two years of Standard because they had a chance to kill it and skipped out.
Infinite Stars
Member
i lol'd
I guess my two issues with this strategy are: one, why do you want your entire hype cycle for the next set weighed down by people shitting on it because they're bitter about the current competitive cycle? And two, if they're going to treat every Standard environment as "basically over" by this point in the cycle, why even bother adding a second announcement? Under the old system everyone would have already accepted that this season was thrown in the trash, but now people have to worry that they're going to do something even dumber like let Copycat stick around for two years of Standard because they had a chance to kill it and skipped out.
Yeah, the "Oh we're adding a second ban period" seemed like a direct answer to them missing CopyCat, so them not going after it with an axe seems like bad PR.
Granted, using two weeks old data when the last 2 have had significant changes to the point where your argument fails to remain relevant is so stupid. There's no way that this doesn't backfire, especially since half of "the meta" they mentioned failed to show up at all yesterday
SigmasonicX
Member
TBF, the very fact that the meta game changed after two weeks (even if it was to settle) makes their choice to be cautious about bans have more merit. Since this is their first "mid season ban announcement", they really wanted to be careful about setting precedents, and any sign that there was still change in the Standard environment was reason enough to hold off. Still the wrong decision, but it's more understandable in that light.
Sort of makes me wonder why they bothered adding this mid season B&R announcement then.
Even two weeks ago I feel we knew B/G was dying though.
charlequin
Banned
I mean, they did set a precedent, and that precedent is "even though we added an extra B&R announcement we will not use it out of cowardice."
We see Relic because it cantrips and doesnt require a color commitment and it isnt a permanent off switch for decks that sometimes like using the graveyard. RiP is the more powerful but less flexible option.
Angry Grimace
Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
i lol'd
I guess my two issues with this strategy are: one, why do you want your entire hype cycle for the next set weighed down by people shitting on it because they're bitter about the current competitive cycle? And two, if they're going to treat every Standard environment as "basically over" by this point in the cycle, why even bother adding a second announcement? Under the old system everyone would have already accepted that this season was thrown in the trash, but now people have to worry that they're going to do something even dumber like let Copycat stick around for two years of Standard because they had a chance to kill it and skipped out.
I think the idea was that given they missed the interaction entirely, they weren't sure if it was going to literally be "Splinter Twin in a Standard with no removal," e.g. the only competitive deck at all, in which case they would need it to save the game. I think they figure the fact that its not actually the only plausible deck means they can just ride it out for 4 more weeks. That said, almost everyone expects it to eat the ban at Amonkhet unless there's a random shift in design philosophy in that set. Virtually every pro says the Cat should be banned, as do most reasonably competitive player I've spoken to at the store or online. The only person I've ever even spoken to who likes the combo or thinks its okay is that one guy in this thread.
Did anyone seriously think that they would ban something in standard? Wizards doesn't want to have two back to back bannings in standard because it makes the format lose legitimacy. The let collected company dominate for a few months despite the fact that they could have easily banned it. As for modern I expected nothing even though I want a SFM unban and a skull ban. Wait for amonkhet to get new decks. I'm sure that wizards will push some new mechanic just as hard as vehicles and give us little interaction to deal with it.
divisionbyzorro
Member
- Pre-release, the idea of a "splinter twin" deck in Standard was really scary. We thought it might get prematurely banned.
- Instead, Wizards banned three (!!!!) cards, none of which were Felidar Guardian.
- At the same time, Wizards announced that they were adding an additional cycle of bans.
- "Ah ha!" we thought. "They don't want to ban a card before release because that makes them look bad, so obviously they'll ban it in that offcycle period."
I'm actually quite surprised they didn't ban the cat. It makes little to no sense, tbh.
Huh, figured the cat was gonna get banned. Was trying to fit in as many tournaments with aetherworks saheeli as possible before switching to some Whirler Virtuoso brew.
If there's more support for the archtype in Amonkhet - even just some solid manafixing - this could be an awkward pro tour.
If there's more support for the archtype in Amonkhet - even just some solid manafixing - this could be an awkward pro tour.
Angry Grimace
Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
I have yet to read any pro that thinks Guardian/Saheeli is a good thing to have in Standard or that it will survive its full 2 years. They really need to just bite the bullet on it.
That's by itself the reason why Pros and most players don't like the combo - it doesn't actually need much in the way of support. They just need each other. Whatever the cards around it are doing aren't necessarily relevant beyond making sure you're still alive to combo off.
Almost everyone believed they were going to ban the Cat, from Pro Players, to SaffronOlive, to everyone in this thread and on reddit. Most people I've read seem to think the Cat still *should* be banned. So I don't think you can really characterize it as an unrealistic assumption. Reading between the lines on the justification they gave, it seems clear they'd rather try and ride it out until Amonkhet (which if they had just been honest about, I would be okay with since its only a month or so off and you can definitely improve the optics of a ban at that point).
The only ban I think everyone seems to agree on is Felidar Guardian though. I don't think there's much consensus on banning something out of Mardu (even though Mardu is probably a better deck), because its unclear whether you could answer Mardu in the next set.
There's also the issue that despite the fact that banning a card like Emrakul is splashy but its also easily defensible. I think banning Reflector Mage is a lot more controversial of a move (even though in hindsight it would have made Jeskai Saheeli matches utterly miserable). Banning cards that are just incremental parts of decks but not in-and-of themselves broken is a weird place to be in because you're setting a weird precedent for banning virtually anything even when its not itself problematic.
charlequin
Banned
The format already has zero legitimacy and they specifically said that not banning CoCo was a mistake.
Copycat 100% needs to be banned so letting it linger right now seems pretty unnecessary.
Big Icarus
Member
I'm not surprised by the announcement. Wizards has already eroded consumer confidence in buying into Standard once this year. That's not something they do lightly, and banning cards in a set that had just recently been released right before they get ready to hype their next expansion looks really bad.
My guess is that come Amonket the cat and Gideon are gone. Cat for obvious reasons, and banning Gideon when they have a brand new and likely less oppressive version of him to sell in Amonket would be the only justifiable time to ban a card that marketing wants to prop up as a "face" character.
My guess is that come Amonket the cat and Gideon are gone. Cat for obvious reasons, and banning Gideon when they have a brand new and likely less oppressive version of him to sell in Amonket would be the only justifiable time to ban a card that marketing wants to prop up as a "face" character.
Angry Grimace
Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
I don't envy them having to manage optics here. Because that's all it is: there's absolutely no way you're going to convince me that Aaron Forsythe legitimately thinks Cat Combo should stick around. I think they were probably of the mind that they weren't going to ban ANYTHING in the second window unless we had a full-on Jace, the Mind Sculptor problem.
The problem with banning something in the "second ban window" timeframe is that there's practically no incentive for disappointed players to buy back into Standard if you ban out an entire deck. If you ban it right before Amonkhet prerelease, you still have lots of players who will be playing with and buying those cards regardless.
I think they would run into a serious, serious problem if they passed on a cat ban a second time. It's not a good card or interaction to have in standard, period, end of story. The fact that the interaction was considered degenerate in Modern says it all, to me. It's almost funny that they've cut back on Modern so hard, yet people's perception of Modern as a format are at almost an all time high.
If they don't ban the cat with Amonkhet, then surely they must be thinking that the new set is gonna cause a dramatic metagame shift. And given how they've been operating lately, it's wouldn't happen due to better answers, but rather due to more powerful and insane threats. Call me cynical, but I'm worried either way.
Nothing like relying on a new set that was likely compromised by the reshuffled rotation schedule to fix problems with a broken standard environment. What are the odds that they printed an answer in Amonkhet to an instant-win, turn four combo that they didn't discover until after Aether Revolt was revealed to the public?
I wonder if Gideon will be banned when Amonkhet is released, citing the previous rotation schedule and the new set not being designed with his power/abilities in mind.
Angry Grimace
Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
I don't like to speculate on what's in Amonkhet since I have no idea what's in it. The only reason I have low expectations for it in general is that WOTC's design philosophy has been borked since they switched to the 2 set thing (which probably has no relationship to that switch, of course). In hindsight, the first sign of trouble was printing Gideon, Ally of Zendikar, while Hero's Downfall rotated out without a viable replacement.
Elspeth, Sun's Champion was a more powerful card than Gideon that did less damage because its Standard existence was always tied to Hero's Downfall's legality.
The entire "BFZ doesn't rotate" thing is very strange in retrospect. It doesn't seem like it makes much sense to announce that and put it into effect immediately as opposed to announcing it but having it not do anything until well into the future (which is how they did the original rotation change announcement). They just as easily could have said "BFZ rotates like we said, but starting in the fall we're going back to Fall rotations only."
Elspeth, Sun's Champion was a more powerful card than Gideon that did less damage because its Standard existence was always tied to Hero's Downfall's legality.
The entire "BFZ doesn't rotate" thing is very strange in retrospect. It doesn't seem like it makes much sense to announce that and put it into effect immediately as opposed to announcing it but having it not do anything until well into the future (which is how they did the original rotation change announcement). They just as easily could have said "BFZ rotates like we said, but starting in the fall we're going back to Fall rotations only."
Big Icarus
Member
Gideon existing with two consecutive expansions that completely lacked any reliable instant speed planeswalker removal, make me skeptical that they are actually attempting to design cohesive sets that do take into account the ridiculous power level of the cards development puts in the game to promote their "brand".
Angry Grimace
Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
The problem with Gideon is that it seems it should be a threshold question whether a 4-mana Planeswalker that protects itself extremely well should be able to win the game by itself as rapidly as Gideon does. Even the pros underestimated Gideon because they ran into the assumption that his baseline ability was the ultimate, and not swinging for an indestructible 5 + 2.
Angry Grimace
Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
I understand from a flavor perspective why Gideon has Indestructible, but from a gameplay perspective its overkill.
BBD is probably correct that a card like Pithing Needle is super simple and solves a ton of problems. I would probably consider playing 4 copies in my Improvise deck. Seriously.
charlequin
Banned
They banned Emrakul. Marketing is a problem in getting these cards to the spot they're at, but the point where they're getting top-down orders not to ban cards because of their brand positioning is way further down the slope.
Yeah, it's weird since it both cut against a block they'd designed with the old rotation in mind and carried over a block that basically nobody actually wanted to stay legal a second longer. My best guess is that they thought it'd reduce confusion, but I think the result was the exact opposite.
Well, thus my question about the benefit of the second ban window. To me the reason to have it is that they can't guarantee formats stay worthwhile for the full window between sets or that they catch the worst offenders in the leadup to the Pro Tour. If there's an inherent marketing incentive to never ban at that midpoint it's bullshit to pretend to have it.
There's a pretty simple list of stuff that needs to exist to keep formats reasonable: card-specific board lockdown (Pithing Needle or Phyrexian Revoker), efficient and good PW removal (Hero's Downfall), moderate graveyard hate, good 5 mana creature sweeper in white, decent 2-3 mana AOE sweeper in red, decent mass artifact removal... what am I missing?
Familienoberhauptvogel
Banned
I called that, I called that shit hard when AER released. It just made so much sense.
But you are still wrong about control in Modern, so you can never be a winner.
Familienoberhauptvogel
Banned
Well I'm right about unbanning SFM otoh.
She has to get in line behind Twin, Jace and BBE (because where Jace goes she follows).
Familienoberhauptvogel
Banned
only batterskull has to go, if at all
Angry Grimace
Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
I mean, Pithing Needle is actually a fairly narrow card - it hates on a wide variety lot of stuff, but it also only does one thing at a time, instead of doing a lot of things at a time, e.g. "all artifacts suck now," or "all Planeswalkers suck now."
Familienoberhauptvogel
Banned
Most of the white stuff that is in maindecks is either path or is multicolour. Did Todd's GW CoCo list even run a monowhite creature for instance?
Lingering souls is the big one in Abzan.
Lingering souls is the big one in Abzan.
Angry Grimace
Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
They aren't going to unban anything in Modern. They have no incentive to do it.
SFM does a fundamentally broken thing.
Jace adds nothing good to the format but cost of entry.
BBE and Deathrite Shaman don't have a purpose but to make an existing deck better.
Twin represents a conscious decision to get rid of a super easy to assemble combo that disproportionately affects the metagame and sideboarding choices.
Everything else (other than arguably GSZ) is on the SUPER BANNED list or otherwise dumb.
Ancient Den - Artifact Land
Birthing Pod - Miserable Same-y Decks that invalidate a ton of strategies by Podding in one dude who breaks your deck.
Blazing Shoal - Infect BS
Chrome Mox - SUPER BANNED because its fast mana and no deck playing this is up to anything good.
Cloudpost - SUPER BANNED fast mana
Dark Depths - SUPER BANNED - 20/20 Indestructible on Turn 2.
Dig Through Time - SUPER BANNED
Dread Return - SUPER BANNED
Eye of Ugin - SUPER BANNED; Fast Mana; Eldrazi Winter
Gitaxian Probe - Probe made the format better when banned, Phyrexian Mana is Bullshit
Glimpse of Nature - SUPER BANNED, 1 mana card that makes you win instantly
Golgari Grave-Troll - Dredge sucks and it just makes it better and just got re-banned.
Great Furnace - Artifact Land
Green Sun's Zenith - Could at least argue for it with Traverse being around, I guess.
Hypergenesis - SUPER BANNED
Mental Misstep - SUPER BANNED
Ponder - Deck manipulation
Preordain - Deck manipulation
Punishing Fire - Miserable play pattern; does nothing but make Jund better.
Rite of Flame - Non-interactive Storm Bullshit.
Seat of the Synod - Artifact Land
Second Sunrise - People have things to do
Seething Song - Non-interactive Storm Bullshit
Sensei's Divining Top - People have things to do
Skullclamp - SUPER BANNED
Summer Bloom - Nobody should have to learn whatever it is that Amulet does
Treasure Cruise - SUPER BANNED
Tree of Tales - Artifact Land
Umezawa's Jitte - SUPER BANNED
Vault of Whispers - Artifact Land
SFM does a fundamentally broken thing.
Jace adds nothing good to the format but cost of entry.
BBE and Deathrite Shaman don't have a purpose but to make an existing deck better.
Twin represents a conscious decision to get rid of a super easy to assemble combo that disproportionately affects the metagame and sideboarding choices.
Everything else (other than arguably GSZ) is on the SUPER BANNED list or otherwise dumb.
Ancient Den - Artifact Land
Birthing Pod - Miserable Same-y Decks that invalidate a ton of strategies by Podding in one dude who breaks your deck.
Blazing Shoal - Infect BS
Chrome Mox - SUPER BANNED because its fast mana and no deck playing this is up to anything good.
Cloudpost - SUPER BANNED fast mana
Dark Depths - SUPER BANNED - 20/20 Indestructible on Turn 2.
Dig Through Time - SUPER BANNED
Dread Return - SUPER BANNED
Eye of Ugin - SUPER BANNED; Fast Mana; Eldrazi Winter
Gitaxian Probe - Probe made the format better when banned, Phyrexian Mana is Bullshit
Glimpse of Nature - SUPER BANNED, 1 mana card that makes you win instantly
Golgari Grave-Troll - Dredge sucks and it just makes it better and just got re-banned.
Great Furnace - Artifact Land
Green Sun's Zenith - Could at least argue for it with Traverse being around, I guess.
Hypergenesis - SUPER BANNED
Mental Misstep - SUPER BANNED
Ponder - Deck manipulation
Preordain - Deck manipulation
Punishing Fire - Miserable play pattern; does nothing but make Jund better.
Rite of Flame - Non-interactive Storm Bullshit.
Seat of the Synod - Artifact Land
Second Sunrise - People have things to do
Seething Song - Non-interactive Storm Bullshit
Sensei's Divining Top - People have things to do
Skullclamp - SUPER BANNED
Summer Bloom - Nobody should have to learn whatever it is that Amulet does
Treasure Cruise - SUPER BANNED
Tree of Tales - Artifact Land
Umezawa's Jitte - SUPER BANNED
Vault of Whispers - Artifact Land
Infinite Stars
Member
Mystic doesn't do anything that's broken in a format where there's 1 Mana 7/7s.
If Green can get 6/7s for 2 White can get a 1/2 + at best a 4/4 Vigilance Lifelinker. Only the third best equipment is modern Legal, and I don't think Modern would snap in half if Mystic comes off.
A perk of the new B&R update is that Wizards could unban her, mention that it's a test, and if she proves to be truly awful for the format they can put her back on the list. It's no different then Grave Troll, but at least Mystic doesn't limit design space for a fundamental part of the game(Thanks Graveyard)
Twin is staying on the banlist, because #FuckTwin. all the arguments that "IT HELPS BLUE" are wrong because all Twin did was function as a bandaid for Modern.
BBE will never be unbanned as long as Jund remains tier 1. Jund getting to go "BBE into Liliana" is too strong for a format that can't even allow Mystic in.
Jace does nothing to help blue and only creates $3000 Sultai.
If Green can get 6/7s for 2 White can get a 1/2 + at best a 4/4 Vigilance Lifelinker. Only the third best equipment is modern Legal, and I don't think Modern would snap in half if Mystic comes off.
A perk of the new B&R update is that Wizards could unban her, mention that it's a test, and if she proves to be truly awful for the format they can put her back on the list. It's no different then Grave Troll, but at least Mystic doesn't limit design space for a fundamental part of the game(Thanks Graveyard)
Twin is staying on the banlist, because #FuckTwin. all the arguments that "IT HELPS BLUE" are wrong because all Twin did was function as a bandaid for Modern.
BBE will never be unbanned as long as Jund remains tier 1. Jund getting to go "BBE into Liliana" is too strong for a format that can't even allow Mystic in.
Jace does nothing to help blue and only creates $3000 Sultai.
divisionbyzorro
Member
Traverse plays the role of "late-game" Green Sun's Zenith in Modern without also being "early-game" Green Sun's Zenith. GSZ has the same issue as Deathrite - it's really good turn one and really good turn 10. There's just no opportunity cost, and that level of flexibility just isn't healthy.
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