They made their strategy clear in 2013 when they banned Bloodbraid Elf instead of Deathrite Shaman. They will never ban rares from the current set unless they have absolutely no choice at all.
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Magic: The Gathering |OT| Core Set 2020 - Red Head Wins
- Thread starter SigmasonicX
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They made their strategy clear in 2013 when they banned Bloodbraid Elf instead of Deathrite Shaman. They will never ban rares from the current set unless they have absolutely no choice at all.
The difference is that right now with Hogaak that approach didn't work. They got rid of altar and not only it was replaced with a card that gave the deck much higher consistency, it went and got the highest win rate of all the highly played decks at a PT and if it wasn't for the limited part also counting, 4 out of the top 8 would have been Hogaak. So if they're not banning Hogaak what other option they have? Ban all the modern legal cards in BG that throw stuff to the graveyard one way or another? It's either Hogaak next Monday as an emergency ban then rethink the status of the format regarding the main bullshit enablers (looting, stirrings, etc...) for the next formal B&R, or see for how long they can let a turn 2 combo deck run unchecked just because it's selling packs while playing a game of whack-a-mole with all the cards that make Hogaak do its thing one way or another.
The only in-print rare I can remember them banning from Modern was Dig Through Time. But that wasn't an embarrassment; it was fine in Standard. Banning a rare from the Modern Horizons set basically says "we don't know what the fuck we're doing" and is a threat for sales of future Horizons sets.
People have been calling for Looting to be banned for a long-ass time. It's the easy way out for them. I highly doubt they ban Hogaak or Altar.
People have been calling for Looting to be banned for a long-ass time. It's the easy way out for them. I highly doubt they ban Hogaak or Altar.
This is it basically. They can ban Looting, and I would personally be a little sad to see Looting go because I like Phoenix decks, but I can't deny it's a major enabler for a lot powerful unfair effects in the format. I don't think they can only ban Looting though - it breaks several decks while only giving Hogaak a speed bump. I would personally think that Hogaak has to go, and then Faithless Looting could either stay or leave depending on the direction they want to steer things.
Banning looting would just make things worse since Hogaak would be slowed down for like a turn or half a turn, but in the process they would completely kill like half of the top metagame decks that could barely already put some fight against it.
I'm not saying what I think they should do.
I'm saying what I think they will do based on history.
My assumption is that they try to give Hogaak one last chance. I think they want rares in Modern Horions to be legal for at least a year.
I'm saying what I think they will do based on history.
My assumption is that they try to give Hogaak one last chance. I think they want rares in Modern Horions to be legal for at least a year.
If that happens then prepare for the game of whack-a-mole of banning all cards in green and black that can throw stuff into the graveyard one way or another. Do they really want Modern to be an absolute shit show just because of the stubbornness of wanting a extremely problematic card to be legal just because it's in currently sold packs? Like, imagine looting is banned: Phoenix (both izzet and monored) is out, dredge and mardu pyro dead, fairer decks like humans and vial in general are unable to reach a game-winning board state before turn 3-4, and Jund does exactly what Hogaak wants (make then throw more stuff to the gy) so what's going to be left? Hogaak, Turn 3 Tron and glass cannon combo like Neobrand?
Think their recent aggressiveness with printing cards for Eternal formats has had some pretty negative effects. Modern sucked this weekend, Vintage is maybe the worst it's ever been. I legit think Modern would be much, much better if they banned fifty cards.
Legacy is great however except for everything being W6 now
I think they should do a full-stop redo of the banned list honestly.
I'm honestly fine with Stoneforge in a vacuum and think it's less harmful than a bunch of other stuff currently running around in the format. I wonder if they're saving an unbanning for a future Modern Horizons style reprinting because it still being banned now looks pretty silly.
SFM: turn 3 Batterskull if you manage to draw SFM early and not having her die between turns 2 and 3.
Tron: super consistent turn 3/4 game ending threat where all pieces are redundant, can be tutored for 1 or 2 mana and attempts at interaction are futile.
It's beyond ridiculous.
I love love LOVE Tron and even I can admit that the comparison there is absurd. SFM is fine.
For sure. And given where the format is at I can't believe they aren't planning an unbanning in a future supplemental set at some point in the future. It's such a low-impact high profile unbanning. It's all upside breaking this card out of jail. Plus I could unload my copies so I'm all for it haha
What a hideous format, time to take it out back and shoot. At least Jund got there so not all is lost I guess.
EDIT: Meant for Arena thread, not the main one.
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Since April 2016. So over 3 years. It's long enough to be an established deck.
Agreed. I really, really want to buy into a modern deck, but the whole format just seems...atrocious. It's so fast that it takes out a ton of fun deck concepts. I think you were right earlier - they just need to scrap the ban list and start over.
Urza and goblin engineer catapulted it to one of the better decks in modern but thopter sword has been a relevant combo since the sword came of the banlist to varying degrees. It used to be the wincon for whir prison at the beginning of the year and it used to be a deck comboing with KCI before people figured out the KCI deck. The pieces remained largely the same but Urza makes the deck more resilient to hate and more definitive in winning.
By the way, how much did G Tron benefit from London mulligan? Do they still have it turn 4 on average or is it now always on 3? What a nightmare.
I didn't watch the whole thing but Thoralf managed to have turn 3 tron every single game I did watch
I've been cowardly this month to ensure a top 1000 finish, since it's my second month playing ranked for real.
Last night I went YOLO, played four matches. Won, loss, loss, won. Estimates of roughly 400 to 298 to 658 to 1028 to 520 For that last win, I beat whomever was #4, and that was by far the largest jump I've ever witnessed...at least 300 spots bigger than what I've had before. The other matches were players around each of those listed ranks.
The incentive to play is just not there versus the insane drops from a loss. Tracker shows I'm around 14-7!
Last night I went YOLO, played four matches. Won, loss, loss, won. Estimates of roughly 400 to 298 to 658 to 1028 to 520 For that last win, I beat whomever was #4, and that was by far the largest jump I've ever witnessed...at least 300 spots bigger than what I've had before. The other matches were players around each of those listed ranks.
The incentive to play is just not there versus the insane drops from a loss. Tracker shows I'm around 14-7!
Modern could use a shakeup, a realignment. I think most people would agree. I feel like the banned list is pretty out of whack. Let's play armchair DCI. Here are the changes I would personally consider to hopefully get things on a better track. I know people will disagree with some if not all of these, but what's the fun if we're all on the same page? Let's have a discussion!
How I would attempt to fix Modern
1. Ban Faithless Looting
It's too big of an enabler for too many broken things. It's been running rampant for far too long. There are plenty of cards that do what this does to a lesser degree, like Thought Scour or Stitcher's Supplier, so many of the decks will be able to adjust. Maybe they see it as Modern's Brainstorm? I kind of feel like Brainstorm should be gone form Legacy, but that's a whole other conversation.
2. Free Stoneforge Mystic
It's a fine card, there's a multitude of powerful strategies in the format that it slots in beside. We're far enough away from Worldwake standard for this to matter anymore. Even Jace has returned. It would open up new deckbuilding options and it's not broken in any way. It's time.
3. Ban Ancient Stirrings
If we're shaking things up, this is a good one to hit. I love Tron, but the consistency might be a bit much now with the London Mulligan. Something is going to have to give, and we can't trade one boogeyman for another. Tron will survive and find other ways to dig.
4. Ban Cryptic Command
Two incredible cards for the price of one, gets recurrsion with Snapcaster. It's honestly too good of a toolbox, and Archmage's Charm is a comparable toolbox that is a bit more fair and is here to replace it. I thought about putting Celestial Colonnade on the list as well because it basically kills the need for any other finisher in the color combo. but I think control decks need to find their footing again before making that move.
5. Free Splinter Twin
Turn 4 doesn't seem so bad anymore does it? Especially now that we have Force of Negation or even Force of Vigor to help police this one. I think it's time to let it back in the door for a trial run and see if it can play nice.
6. Ban Simian Spirit Guide
Nothing good has come from this card ever.
7. Ban Hogaak
Pod got the axe for the same reason I think this needs to. Anything you print now is going to be under the shadow of whatever nonsense can be enabled by this thing. Even if you ban all of its enablers now, it's going to be a problem down the road for design and development.
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I feel like these 7 changes would make a huge impact on the format and push things in a new, potentially more fair direction where games last a few more turns and have some actual interaction. I'm curious to hear what you folks think.
How I would attempt to fix Modern
1. Ban Faithless Looting
It's too big of an enabler for too many broken things. It's been running rampant for far too long. There are plenty of cards that do what this does to a lesser degree, like Thought Scour or Stitcher's Supplier, so many of the decks will be able to adjust. Maybe they see it as Modern's Brainstorm? I kind of feel like Brainstorm should be gone form Legacy, but that's a whole other conversation.
2. Free Stoneforge Mystic
It's a fine card, there's a multitude of powerful strategies in the format that it slots in beside. We're far enough away from Worldwake standard for this to matter anymore. Even Jace has returned. It would open up new deckbuilding options and it's not broken in any way. It's time.
3. Ban Ancient Stirrings
If we're shaking things up, this is a good one to hit. I love Tron, but the consistency might be a bit much now with the London Mulligan. Something is going to have to give, and we can't trade one boogeyman for another. Tron will survive and find other ways to dig.
4. Ban Cryptic Command
Two incredible cards for the price of one, gets recurrsion with Snapcaster. It's honestly too good of a toolbox, and Archmage's Charm is a comparable toolbox that is a bit more fair and is here to replace it. I thought about putting Celestial Colonnade on the list as well because it basically kills the need for any other finisher in the color combo. but I think control decks need to find their footing again before making that move.
5. Free Splinter Twin
Turn 4 doesn't seem so bad anymore does it? Especially now that we have Force of Negation or even Force of Vigor to help police this one. I think it's time to let it back in the door for a trial run and see if it can play nice.
6. Ban Simian Spirit Guide
Nothing good has come from this card ever.
7. Ban Hogaak
Pod got the axe for the same reason I think this needs to. Anything you print now is going to be under the shadow of whatever nonsense can be enabled by this thing. Even if you ban all of its enablers now, it's going to be a problem down the road for design and development.
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I feel like these 7 changes would make a huge impact on the format and push things in a new, potentially more fair direction where games last a few more turns and have some actual interaction. I'm curious to hear what you folks think.
i can't really tell you whether a faithless looting ban would help or hurt the format for the short-term. all i'll say is that the balance process as a whole has failed if draw 2 discard 2 is even in the conversation.
the balance problems with this game are always with things that cost too little (either in terms of mana and/or card cost)
looking through the last MC top 8 maindecks, these are cards that fit that description:
- urza's lands, ancient stirrings
- mox opal
- eldrazi temple
- wrenn & six
- gravecrawler, bloodghast, vengevine, hogaak
- arclight phoenix, manamorphose, gut shot, finale of promise, light up the stage
- sword of the meek
the ones that are interesting to debate are ancient stirrings, wrenn & six, manamorphose, gut shot, finale of promise, light up the stage. you can have an actual discussion about cost & benefit & rate of return with these. the rest of the list is just free stuff.
with all the free stuff, you're basically relying on some team at WotC to police the format. that can sort of work, but based on how they operate the format is basically doomed to mediocrity by relying on that method.
on the other hand, if cards are balanced in isolation, then the deckbuilding strategy becomes more pure. the meta becomes shaped organically by players instead of artificially by the game's stewards. the developer would only need to police combos and just ban cards that exceed the acceptable rates of return.
imo that type of balancing is the best fit for WotC and MtG's expansion design. they have enough general design-for-fun sense to make subjective judgements about whether some combos are fun/fine/fair and some aren't. and rate of return of individual cards is more objective (which just means it's harder to screw up decisions about banning those).
the other type of balancing of balancing where individuals have to subjectively allow some broken stuff but not others is far more error-prone. and it basically guarantees the format will be entirely about the balance mistakes and it dooms all the fair cards (which are 99% of MtG cards).
i think MtG's card designers are way better than their tournament-level gameplay stewards, so i would favor a balance strategy that's based on clamping power level. this maximizes the excitement from new cards, and i think new cards are WotC's best work (not only because that's what their best team works on, but also because that's where they get to incorporate knowledge from experience/successes/mistakes/iteration).
obviously the chance of this happening is 0 because it would require banning way too many things. but that's how i'd fix modern.
Well, don't get us wrong, it's messy but it's still very fun to play unlike current Standard where pretty much all decks except Burn and maybe Vampires (a WW evolution) just play a game of who can goldfish into the biggest most stupid "I win" card the fastest without being disrupted.
We complain, well, at least I do, because I love the format despite its flaws and hope they can fix them.
Y'all are nuts - that's too much at once. I would ban Looting and unban Stoneforge. Then I would unban Twin 3-6 months later assuming the format wasn't still horribly broken.
Banning Twin was a mistake. Yes, Modern became more diverse when it was banned. No, the format is not better. Everyone just goldfishes harder and harder now.
Banning Twin was a mistake. Yes, Modern became more diverse when it was banned. No, the format is not better. Everyone just goldfishes harder and harder now.
I'm interested in hearing why. My argument is the card is 4 good card options in one, and being able to do two at instant speed is too good and makes deck construction less interesting. I feel like the natural replacement for it is Archmage's Charm, as its similar toolbox slots right in without being an automatic two for one.
The problem with banning Looting is that Tron gets even more unchecked than it currently is and Hogaak barely gets hit by having one less card dedicated to filling the graveyard that can be covered by something else. The only solution is that Hogaak goes now since otherwise it's a game of whack-a-mole with its enablers, then after the meta stabilises a little bit we get a mass ban of all the problem cards in the format: looting & stirrings for sure, tron lands and manamorphose likely and opal probably.
The only problem I see this way is that Humans can keep on being a 4-5 colour pile since Ancient Ziggurat, Cavern of Souls and Unclaimed Territory do all the heavy lifting since the only non-creature spell it plays is the Vial, so at least one of those lands (probably Cavern) would have to go as well.
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Eldrazi Tron is a thing and doesn't need Stirrings though, so even if the card is busted it's not mandatory to make a tron lands build feasible, and aside for those there's not any other card in that deck that can be considered busted except Chalice. Probably ban also Expedition Map so it's not as easy to assemble tron in turn 3? Otherwise as long as tron lands are legal and easy/cheap to tutor along with 6+ mana colorless threats there's always going to be some way to make the combination busted.
You really think Eldrazi Tron is a problem? I don't think either Tron deck is busted. I think non-Eldrazi Tron is just a little too consistent. I would listen to axing something like Map following Stirrings, but as a one-two punch to see if Stirrings going first is enough.
Anyway, unless they want to be banning one card each couple of months then at least one busted piece of each top tier deck has to go all at once to get an actual format shakedown that's not actually a pain in the ass extended over 6 months, get people brewing again or at the very least getting the archetypes to work in a way that's not top tier degenerate goldfishing then they can see which way they want to move the format going forwards through MH2 and following sets.
Where to find Commander 2019 previews
OP
OP
After Gen Con, preview days will focus on one deck. The entire deck will be revealed by 3 PM PT each day.
I'm down with unbanning SFM but I think Splinter Twin should stay banned at least for now. They've got all the same consistency for turn 4 (maybe more with London mulligans) but now they can back it up with a free counterspell in FoN.
Like I wrote yesterday, I can get behind a FLooting ban if they're also going to ban Hogaak. Losing Looting hurts other decks so much more than it would hurt Hogaak, there's no good reason to do it without doing both. Any cheap self mill is still a fine enabler for the Gaak and there's no way to ban it all.
I don't think it's time to ban Stirrings yet - G Tron won a big tournament as a good anti-anti-Hogaak metagame call, but isn't dominating the format or anything. Maybe once the dust settles around other bannings if it becomes a big problem. I feel kind of similar about SSG in that it's not dominating the format, even if it's a powerful effect. It lets you cheat on mana it's still card disadvantage and it's only a one time effect so high risk if your payoff doesn't work out.
Can't get behind a Cryptic ban at all, Control is lackluster enough in Modern, let them have some good cards to play with.
Spicy(?) take: ban Chalice of the Void. Prison effects are always unfun and this is one of the strongest ones and only requires a single card. It's way too easy to shut off entire decks on turn 1 or 2 with Chalice.
Like I wrote yesterday, I can get behind a FLooting ban if they're also going to ban Hogaak. Losing Looting hurts other decks so much more than it would hurt Hogaak, there's no good reason to do it without doing both. Any cheap self mill is still a fine enabler for the Gaak and there's no way to ban it all.
I don't think it's time to ban Stirrings yet - G Tron won a big tournament as a good anti-anti-Hogaak metagame call, but isn't dominating the format or anything. Maybe once the dust settles around other bannings if it becomes a big problem. I feel kind of similar about SSG in that it's not dominating the format, even if it's a powerful effect. It lets you cheat on mana it's still card disadvantage and it's only a one time effect so high risk if your payoff doesn't work out.
Can't get behind a Cryptic ban at all, Control is lackluster enough in Modern, let them have some good cards to play with.
Spicy(?) take: ban Chalice of the Void. Prison effects are always unfun and this is one of the strongest ones and only requires a single card. It's way too easy to shut off entire decks on turn 1 or 2 with Chalice.
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