White's the best splash color, but it's not leaps ahead. No one is building a deck and adding White solely for 1-4x Copies of sideboard cards*
As for Jeskai being a deck, it had one Flash in the pan over the past 2 years during the Nahiri Hype and really hasn't made any improvements since.
*The only deck that runs a white splash solely in the side is Elves, and that's because each White Hatebear has effectively 9 copies for each 1of(1 of, Chord, CoCo.)
Actually, it's definitely been done before. Maybe not in the current meta.
I was speaking of UWR being a deck actually before Nahiri. It's been awhile. Won the Pro Tour in 2014, I believe. It was fun to watch Shaun McLaren win that one.
Saw some tech on using Ulvenwald Hydra to grab Shrine of the Forsaken Gods to ramp into Ulamogs from hand. Nice. I'll run that.
Brad Nelson was running that last week when he won GP Omaha undefeated. He said it was the best way to fight the decks that get rid of your Marvels (so you can do your thing without relying on Marvel g2/3).
I mean, not to discount him/his victory, but Players playing Subpar Modern Decks doesn't make the decks any less bad. See: That guy at GP Vancouver that top 8d with 8Rack/Guy at Dallas who won with Skred. Both won/top8'd GPs, Excitement happened, but the decks were mostly dead come a month out. There's also the fact that Wizards can be very, very selective in what 5-0s they post, so I'm not sure using 5-0s is the best indicator for how good the deck is.Ryoichi Tamada got top 8 in Kobe by going back to basics with his UWR Control a couple of weeks ago and the deck has been posting tons of 5-0s since. Could have legs!
not sure if even Bolas would want a weak planeswalkerI really want samut to end up on Bolas' side.
not sure if even Bolas would want a weak planeswalker
Not sure why Bolas would want another Planeswalker at all tbh.Unless it's to harvest their spark or something.
I'm expecting heavy resistance this week so I'll run it main.
I just like the idea of RG villains.not sure if even Bolas would want a weak planeswalker
Got confused for a second and was like 'Bazaar is legal in Legacy??' My memory did not serve me wrong, it is not hahawell there's an oops all spells decks as well as belcher and shit in legacy.
Even manaless dredge relies on bazaar.
but it could be a busted card when you're on the draw.
I never know how formating comes out on PCs. There's a break between those on my phone.
Also I'm starting to get annoyed being asked for trades in my LGS. Do I have to wear a shirt with "No trades" to be left alone?
I'm just sitting here charging my phone and browsing while waiting for FNM to start.
White's the best splash color, but it's not leaps ahead. No one is building a deck and adding White solely for 1-4x Copies of sideboard cards*
As for Jeskai being a deck, it had one Flash in the pan over the past 2 years during the Nahiri Hype and really hasn't made any improvements since.
*The only deck that runs a white splash solely in the side is Elves, and that's because each White Hatebear has effectively 9 copies for each 1of(1 of, Chord, CoCo.)
Look at Monday.http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/news/announcement-week-coming-2017-06-08
Announcements each day next week. The bulk of the new product announcements will be on Wednesday. Digital Next will likely be on Tuesday.
No seriously, somethings changing. (3+1, 2+2 as new rotation setup?)Kind of the elephant in the room for a lot of the last year was that we made a ton of changes in how we made sets, and not all of them worked out as well as we would've liked. I think the move away from three-set blocks was good as a whole but hit some rough spots with the loss of core sets, dealing with more themes per year, and faster Standard rotation.
I think we went into it with the best of intentions and with reasonable ideas on how to tackle things, but between the known unknowns and the unknown unknowns, there were certainly places where we stumbled a bit. I believe we have learned a lot from the whole experience, and while the last year did not always go as smoothly as we might have liked, I think that the end result is that sets and Standard in particular are going to get much stronger. The biggest long-term risk to us is that we stagnate and never try anything new. Even if not all our attempts at improvement work out, the ones that do pay dividends in the future. I mean, the net result of us making those changes was the creation of some additional process changes that you will learn of soon enough, as well as our Play Design team.
Look at Monday.
In b4 Kirblar was right.
No seriously, somethings changing. (3+1, 2+2 as new rotation setup?)
Hold your horses. You're only right if they bring core sets back, which I still believe they won't do.Look at Monday.
In b4 Kirblar was right.
http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/latest-developments/changes-2017-06-09
No seriously, somethings changing. (3+1, 2+2 as new rotation setup?)
I'd love Standard being 7-8 blocks with a 2x rotation, but I doubt it happens.I am going to make a wild guess that they are going to change rotation. This is completely based on the fact that Rosewater told someone on his blog last week that Innistrad wasn't rotating out till next year and didn't correct his post till two days later. Its also possible he just forgot...
I am going to make a wild guess that they are going to change rotation. This is completely based on the fact that Rosewater told someone on his blog last week that Innistrad wasn't rotating out till next year and didn't correct his post till two days later. Its also possible he just forgot...
That wasn't the problem. BFZ/SoI/Kaladesh problem cards were issues regardless of how long they were in Standard. They changed their entire philosophy w/ face cards and it blew up on them.Changing rotation again? Most of their problems were created with sets being longer in standard than expected, I doubt they'll lengthen the rotation cycle yet once more.
No seriously, somethings changing. (3+1, 2+2 as new rotation setup?)
I still don't understand your logic behind this.They're burning through worlds, themes and mechanics too quickly right now. They need something to put on the brakes.
2 worlds/year is actually kinda overwhelming for players.
Emrakul unban.Moving the Banlist announcement to its own day tells me something major is going on.
Moving the Banlist announcement to its own day tells me something major is going on.
Moving the B&R day off of their announcement day is curious for sure but it also might not mean anything.
I've been thinking they will still do 2+2 each year, but the two blocks will be more closely related in theme and mechanics. Like if they had done SOI / Amonkhet back-to-back. Or perhaps like if they had done small expansions to Rise of the Eldrazi or Dragons of Tarkir.
They're burning through worlds, themes and mechanics too quickly right now.
2 worlds/year is actually kinda overwhelming for players.
I still don't understand your logic behind this.
So we're just ignoring what he wrote right after?"more themes per year" was specifically called out as a "rough spot" in the linked article.
They did that with three sets too! See Theros, Tarkir, etc.I didn't invent it. The pace feels overwhelming to me right now., mechanics are getting 1 set to shine then being discarded (see: Investigate, that Convoke for Artifacts mechanic, etc.) and it just generally feels like the brakes need to be put on in some form.
The story is the part that benefitted, but at the expense of the game itself. And that's not a good tradeoff!
They're burning through worlds, themes and mechanics too quickly right now. They need something to put on the brakes.
2 worlds/year is actually kinda overwhelming for players.
I didn't invent it. The pace feels overwhelming to me right now., mechanics are getting 1 set to shine then being discarded (see: Investigate, that Convoke for Artifacts mechanic, etc.) and it just generally feels like the brakes need to be put on in some form.
What's wrong with them going back to to 3 sets per block?
I didn't invent it. The pace feels overwhelming to me right now., mechanics are getting 1 set to shine then being discarded (see: Investigate, that Convoke for Artifacts mechanic, etc.) and it just generally feels like the brakes need to be put on in some form.
The story is the part that benefitted, but at the expense of the game itself. And that's not a good tradeoff!
See the article announcing the shift to the current block format.What's wrong with them going back to to 3 sets per block?
That wasn't the problem. BFZ/SoI/Kaladesh problem cards were issues regardless of how long they were in Standard. They changed their entire philosophy w/ face cards and it blew up on them.
how are they burning through worlds? ever since the changes we've had 2 returns and 2 new planes.
And forget 3 sets per block. That's always been a crap structure.
We are probably getting two returns in a row in 2018. The first is certainly Dominaria, and the second is possibly Ravnica, though it would be neat if they actually focused on the continent from Mirage, which is now somehow its own plane due to Teferi phasing shenanigans.We have three in a row now though.
They specifically said they want to give people a whole day to digest it, that's pretty much confirmation that it's not nothing.
This doesn't actually solve any particular problems though? Like that doesn't help with the constructed issues or improve the marketing situation.
You really just kind of invented this from whole cloth. They were using mechanics too quickly because they were doing 11 mechanics in two sets. You can do a whole block with 3-4 easily. It makes much more sense to just make blocks simpler than go back to trying to stretch themes out to three sets, which we know basically never works.
Similarly, the story people explicitly wanted them to go to this mode, because it was almost impossible for them to get good engagement with the story content having to stretch each block story out to a whole year. As it is they already can't get through a year of stories on the website without long breaks.
Nah. Again, Hearthstone is my go-to example here. Imagine telling people that instead of three distinct releases every year, they were now going to get three sets of the same theme and same base mechanics -- there'd be riots in the streets. This is the marketing and novelty cadence WotC has to compete with. If they go back to one block a year then if the fall set is a little bit underwhelming they lose a ton of people for at least a whole calendar year.
I'm with you on this. There were a couple of great mechanics that just did not get the time/cards to shine. Also feels like we barely get to do much in these worlds.
I think it's going to alternate as follows:
Year 1: Two blocks of two sets each
Year 2: One block of three sets plus a Core set (or whatever standalone thing they call it)