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[OnPoint]

I wouldn't read too much into the Infect thing - the Infect deck at the Modern PT is likely something they're not happy about.

Griselbrand gives you a T2 kill off Goryo's by letting you go infinite w/ Fury of the Horde. It's inconsistent but can one-shot you.

edit: Counterspell is not the answer. Mana Leak/Remand are just fine. It's other things that are the issue. The large issue with Modern is that they never actually banned the "T3" cards. They instead banned random crap and didn't go deep enough with the cuts initially, leading us to where we are today. You could unban AV, Jace, and BBE and it wouldn't do a whole lot to the format.

They probably aren't. But when

More like they just printed a +6/+6 for G

is the case, maybe it's time to just ban that stupid card.

 

[The Technomancer]

Forget bannings, what could they print that would help the format?

 

[kirblar]

Forget bannings, what could they print that would help the format?

The format's full of cheap universal answers. Printing more of them doesn't help.

 

[ultron87]

They could maybe get away with banning Twin because the other expensive cards in the deck are still good, but a lot of players would still abandon the Modern ship.

 

[ThLunarian]

It's the same as banding, except you are further restricted by what that creature can band with. In this case, it can only band with other Dinosaurs (not a creature type outside of silver-border).

Now as for what banding is, when a creature with banding attacks, you can form a band with up to one other creature without banding and any number of creatures with banding. I don't know if bands with others allows that creature to band with any number of that creature type or not. Attacking creatures in a band are all blocked if any one creature in that band is blocked, and they are all blocked by the blocking creature. You decide what order that your attacking creatures get into combat with the blocking creature.

It has different rules for blocking, and I don't remember what they are.

Believe it or not, the bolded wasn't actually true before 2010. Prior to that, a creature with "Bands with other..." could only band with other creatures that also had a "Bands with other..." ability (or the regular banding ability). Before 2010, this creature would not have even been able to band with other regular dinosaurs.

It kind of makes me sad that there are no other dinosaurs. Pygmy Allosaur says Summon Dinosaur; why would they change it to Lizard?!

At least I can take comfort in knowing that if there's a Pygmy Allosaur and an R&D's Secret Lair on the field, an Old Fogey can band with it.

 

[OnPoint]

I'm honestly surprised they would bring something like Delve back and not be careful about it.

Someone on the previous page mentioned how Murderous Cut is OK, but other spells that reduce to 1 cmc aren't, and how it has to do, possibly, with how they're reactive vs proactive. I actually agree with this.

Treasure Cruise costing 6UU would have been much better than 7U. Same with Become Immense costing two XGG instead of XG. I have long felt Dismember would have been way better balanced at 1B(p) instead of 1(p)(p). If you have reduction costs, there's a fine line to play around with, and they somehow often come up on the wrong side of that when the mechanics are interesting.

Also for what it's worth, I'd be real worried if they banned Twin at this point, but I don't know what else they can do. The deck is insane and kind of the last vestige of the recent "broken" decks.

 

[charlequin]

Unrelated to anything: Antonio DeRosa's apparently making Waste Not happen:

I remember us talking through the shell of this deck a few weeks ago....

This is basically the crux of the "don't have a Modern PT format": The format is secretly busted, the "T3" rationale is actually bullshit, and to actually fix the format you'd have to ban a lot of cards, which WotC doesn't actually want to do because they're afraid of scaring players off, so we're just going to instead pretend the format's not busted by not shining a spotlight on it.

"We shouldn't have a Modern format at all" is an extreme enough conclusion that it casts question over the argument that leads up to it, though. (And "Modern can exist, it just shouldn't be played in competitive events" is basically equivalent.)

I certainly get the complaints, but I'm just not sure I'm convinced the format is actually that terrible.

 

[ThLunarian]

WOTC has no choice but to shine a spotlight on the format, thanks to the Modern Masters series of products. They kind of shot themselves in the foot and are going to continue to pay for it for some time.

I also don't think they can ban Splinter Twin. Can you picture how bad it would look if, after a hypothetical Twin banning, the deck didn't skip a beat and continued to dominate by using Kiki-Jiki instead?

That might or might not be likely, but just the chance of it happening is, I think, enough to keep them from banning one unless they ban both.

 

[Hero]

I love that EVERY major Modern event is followed by "what cards do we have to ban?!" and by love I mean hate with every fiber of my being but WOTC kind of set the stage for this so oh well :/



I'm going to assume you don't play the deck or don't watch it being played? That's incredibly reductive (not that the deck can't mise wins but that's really not how things play out the majority of the time). "Herp derp I win" is not the reality of the situation more often than not.

I've been saying Twin should've been banned since the format/deck showed up. It's dumb. Any two card combo is just dumb, especially when the combo exists in the two colors that have the best instants in the game.

You probably shouldn't assume. I've played Magic for decades. I have played the deck, I have friends that play the deck, I watch Magic streams constantly. U/R Twin is never fun or exciting and while not every game is a free win it gets it often enough that the deck performs well. If it didn't, people wouldn't play it.

WOTC has no choice but to shine a spotlight on the format, thanks to the Modern Masters series of products. They kind of shot themselves in the foot and are going to continue to pay for it for some time.

I also don't think they can ban Splinter Twin. Can you picture how bad it would look if, after a hypothetical Twin banning, the deck didn't skip a beat and continued to dominate by using Kiki-Jiki instead?

That might or might not be likely, but just the chance of it happening is, I think, enough to keep them from banning one unless they ban both.

5 mana for a 2/2 creature is a lot more reasonable, especially considering it's RRR in the casting cost. The one turn makes a huge difference.

 

[kirblar]

Abrupt Decay, while a great card for Legacy, may have really hurt Modern in some ways by making traditional blue tempo decks not a thing. The problems really started showing up post-RTR, and while Deathrite was the biggest issue, Delver decks and other decks like Mono-U Fae basically just died after that.

Kiki isn't nearly as obnoxious as Twin - it's slower, more mana-intensive, and more vulnerable to removal. The +1 turn makes it reliably slaughter-games-able.

 

[sibarraz]

Tomoharu Saito is playing a pseudo warriors mono black deck at GP Memphis. The deck uses Bloodsoaked Champion and Pain Seer to refuel and Obelisk of Urd to power his warriors up. Though Thoughtseize and Hero's Downfall can make the deck a bit pricey.

I see

Im trying to make a whie black deck, also, Im trying to avoid cards from the previous block for the rotation.

I hope that Dragon of tarkir releases some good cards for my deck

 

[Crocodile]

I've been saying Twin should've been banned since the format/deck showed up. It's dumb. Any two card combo is just dumb, especially when the combo exists in the two colors that have the best instants in the game.

You probably shouldn't assume. I've played Magic for decades. I have played the deck, I have friends that play the deck, I watch Magic streams constantly. U/R Twin is never fun or exciting and while not every game is a free win it gets it often enough that the deck performs well. If it didn't, people wouldn't play it.

Just say you don't like the deck and think it's unfun. That's a fine opinion. Saying the deck takes "no skill" is factually wrong. That's what I took objection to.

 

[Hero]

Just say you don't like the deck and think it's unfun. That's a fine opinion. Saying the deck takes "no skill" is factually wrong. That's what I took objection to.

Okay, I'm sorry. The deck takes enough skill that you need to be able to determine which cards you need to scry to the top, which cards to counter that will actively disrupt your game plan and be able to fetch up the correct shocklands.

 

[keeblerdrow]

Finally got all of my cards organized again. They were taking over my desk and brewing table. I haven't put cards away or even put my Khans or Fate cards into binders until today. Took about 5 hours total. Totally worth it. Each binder is a set. They're separated into colors. Inside colors, they are listed by CMC and then alphabetically within CMC. The perfect organization for brewing. It just takes forever to separate my loose stuff from new sets into colors.

 

[SigmasonicX]

Finally got all of my cards organized again. They were taking over my desk and brewing table. I haven't put cards away or even put my Khans or Fate cards into binders until today. Took about 5 hours total. Totally worth it. Each binder is a set. They're separated into colors. Inside colors, they are listed by CMC and then alphabetically within CMC. The perfect organization for brewing. It just takes forever to separate my loose stuff from new sets into colors.

What a coincidence, I'm in the middle of pruning my card collection (removing copies past 2 of cards I'm not too interested in) and putting away cards from drafts and deconstructed decks.

 

["God's Beard!"]

I still feel like Sidisi Whip is strong, but the way I like to play is probably closer to Sultai Control than midrange. My sideboard transforms the deck into the control deck anyway, and I've been thinking about making the transition since the ptq yesterday since I enjoy the post board games so much.

Seeing the deck win again today made the choice a lot easier. I do still believe in Torrent Elemental, though. I'll probably try to include that in some number in the 75, even if it's a little weaker without the sidisi combo.

 

[kirblar]

Per Helene on Twitter - PT Washington DC was their most viewed ever. Its gains were not in line with expected upward trends. Modern is not going anywhere as a PT format.

edit: I really should have looked further back on my blog. Called shot: Tarmogoyf - https://kirblar024.wordpress.com/2011/05/29/the-modern-banlist-why-tarmogoyf-must-go/ , and Ban/Unban thoughts immediately after the first Modern PT: https://kirblar024.wordpress.com/2011/09/17/the-920-modern-br-updates-my-take/

I've hated Twin much longer than I thought.

 

[WanderingWind]

Per Helene on Twitter - PT Washington DC was their most viewed ever. Its gains were not in line with expected upward trends. Modern is not going anywhere as a PT format.

edit: I really should have looked further back on my blog. Called shot: Tarmogoyf - https://kirblar024.wordpress.com/2011/05/29/the-modern-banlist-why-tarmogoyf-must-go/ , and Ban/Unban thoughts immediately after the first Modern PT: https://kirblar024.wordpress.com/2011/09/17/the-920-modern-br-updates-my-take/

I've hated Twin much longer than I thought.

I think you've posted that one before, but I still disagree with your assertion that they'd never print Tarmo in a Standard set. It wouldn't be broken in most Standard formats, doubly so with any format that has a tone of graveyard disruption of basic removals. I think they're worried because it is so good in Modern that it shouldn't be printed, but I think with a tiny bit of foresight, especially in the new, quicker Standard formats coming our way, they could absolutely reprint him without breaking the format.

And the temptation to do it to sell product has got to be very, very pressing. Expect it to happen when the inevitable fad part of the recent MTG phase begins to wan and investors start to put pressure on Hasbro as they look at one of their main pillars starting to falter.

Now, if they ever reprint FoW in a standard set, it's time to start selling off your collection because the end is nigh.

 

[kirblar]

MaRo's actually stated that they're not willing to put it in Standard again. But a few things recently have indicated they might have fixed the rarity in MM2, so hopefully there's progress on that front.

The issue isn't that blue doesn't have the tools like FoW. It's that blue's early creatures in Tempo decks all die to Abrupt Decay in a format where it doesn't have card selection to find more threats.

 

[red13th]

lol Twin won again and went 2-0 against Junk in the top8, Modern is fun.

 

[G.ZZZ]

The format's full of cheap universal answers. Printing more of them doesn't help.

Unbanning Misstep would probably kill all those dumbs combos tbh. Printing actually good universal answer is a solution to the format since legacy has many more accellerators and 2-cards combos than moderns and combo is still a fringe archetype there.

 

[divisionbyzorro]

Seriously. Tom Martell suggested banning Glistener Elf, Amulet (corrected to Summer Bloom by Sam), Splinter Twin, Manamorphose, and Griselbrand, and possibly also Goyf.

This might be the dumbest thing I've ever heard.

It would make infinitely more sense to just kill Modern and call the format a failure than do this.

 

[WanderingWind]

Pros very often want to ban decks they personally either can't beat or don't want to have to sideboard for. It's why I value what pros say about bannings only slightly more than the average poster. Not to mention the ones that are being paid by massive card distributors.

 

[divisionbyzorro]

Pros very often want to ban decks they personally either can't beat or don't want to have to sideboard for. It's why I value what pros say about bannings only slightly more than the average poster. Not to mention the ones that are being paid by massive card distributors.

I completely understand why players "on the train" don't like Modern. They have all sorts of wonderful evidence as to what's wrong with the format and why it doesn't make for a format that they want to have to play on the Pro Tour. But what they think is a "bug" in the format, I think is a feature. I think it's really awesome that so many decks are viable. I think it's really exciting to watch Modern tournaments and see what shakes out; it's so much fun to watch.

And the truth is that these players just don't take Modern seriously enough. He's been brought up before, but Lee Shi Tian made Top 8 in three out of four Modern Pro Tours, playing three completely different decks, and one of those decks was completely unheard-of until the format started. How insane is that?

Modern is one of those formats that you have to study and play almost as a way of life in order to master. (Brief aside unrelated to the main point:

Spoiler

The same is true for Legacy and Vintage. Look at the VSL, where Steve Menendian is clearly a cut above everybody else in that tournament. He lives and breathes Vintage; when he plays, the commentators are constantly saying "I would do [X] instead of what he just did," and yet at the end he still wins.

) That's why Splinter Twin has won the latest set of events - it's a deck that was relatively unchanged, and the unbannings didn't bring to bear any new predators for it, so you were able to bring your years of actual experience with the deck into a tournament where a lot of people are playing a new deck (Abzan) and think they're experts because of its similarity to an old deck (Jund).

Modern certainly isn't perfect. There are cards on the banned list I would like to see off (Bloodbraid Elf for sure, and Ancestral Vision as a slightly risky unban to try to broaden the foundation of "fair" decks in the format), but a mass unbanning is ridiculous.

 

[Socat]

I love that EVERY major Modern event is followed by "what cards do we have to ban?!" and by love I mean hate with every fiber of my being but WOTC kind of set the stage for this so oh well :/

Yeah , really getting sick of this attitude. They need to re-evaluate everything on the banned list instead of just banning everything that wins before the format can self regulate and innovate. BBE, AV and MM all could make a legitimate impact , but wouldn't fix it by themselves.

 

[f0rk]

This might be the dumbest thing I've ever heard.

It would make infinitely more sense to just kill Modern and call the format a failure than do this.

They are pretty much the same thing in my eyes.

It will be interesting to see if they do anything to the ban list before the next modern pro tour, presuming there is one. People complain about staleness before the PT if they don't change anything then, so they sort of have to 'save' any changes so they have something legitimate to do. They only have to make changes if the set has no modern consequences though so it's kinda their own fault (ie there would be no changes needed of pro tour khans was Modern)

 

[OnPoint]

Unbanning Misstep would probably kill all those dumbs combos tbh. Printing actually good universal answer is a solution to the format since legacy has many more accellerators and 2-cards combos than moderns and combo is still a fringe archetype there.

If it were as simple as doing this, I'd LOVE if they did it.

I'd really love if they used the Modern Masters line to reintroduce cards into the format. It would be so awesome.

 

[ultron87]

Unbanning Misstep would probably kill all those dumbs combos tbh. Printing actually good universal answer is a solution to the format since legacy has many more accellerators and 2-cards combos than moderns and combo is still a fringe archetype there.

Wouldn't that just make Twin better since its combo pieces are 3 and 4 mana cards that they can then defend from various one mana answers for "free"?

 

[bigkrev]

MaRo's actually stated that they're not willing to put it in Standard again. But a few things recently have indicated they might have fixed the rarity in MM2, so hopefully there's progress on that front.

The reason is probably that they don't want to print the word "Tribal" on a Standard-legal card. I don't know what Tribal is on the Storm Scale, but it's probably pretty high up there.

Per Helene on Twitter - PT Washington DC was their most viewed ever. Its gains were not in line with expected upward trends. Modern is not going anywhere as a PT format.

People want to watch more than endless Midrange decks- who knew?

 

[ultron87]

The reason is probably that they don't want to print the word "Tribal" on a Standard-legal card. I don't know what Tribal is on the Storm Scale, but it's probably pretty high up there.

They can just exclude it from the reminder text like they did with Shifting Loyalties:

 

[kirblar]

Pros very often want to ban decks they personally either can't beat or don't want to have to sideboard for. It's why I value what pros say about bannings only slightly more than the average poster. Not to mention the ones that are being paid by massive card distributors.

That's not why he's saying those cards- he's rattling off cards that all have legit T3 wins (besides Splinter Twin, which deserves to count as one anyway.) Banning Glistener Elf doesn't kill Infect. It just disables T2 nutdraws and make T3 ones easier to interact with.

 

[divisionbyzorro]

I'd really love if they used the Modern Masters line to reintroduce cards into the format. It would be so awesome.

They need to reframe the definition of Modern and be able to include printings from certain supplemental products. If Lightning Bolt is legal in Modern, I kinda think Counterspell should be too, although I completely understand why you don't want to put it back in Standard.

 

[OnPoint]

They need to reframe the definition of Modern and be able to include printings from certain supplemental products. If Lightning Bolt is legal in Modern, I kinda think Counterspell should be too, although I completely understand why you don't want to put it back in Standard.

Heck yes. It's like when they sneak in Legacy and Vintage cards in weird sets. This should be no different.

 

[bigkrev]

New MTGO Set: Tempest Remastered
http://magic.wizards.com/en/MTGO/ar...line/announcing-tempest-remastered-2015-02-23

Tempest Remastered is a 269-card set, containing 101 commons, 80 uncommons, 53 rares, 15 mythic rares, and 20 basic lands from the Tempest, Stronghold, and Exodus sets. Tempest Remastered will be available in booster pack form, with each booster retailing for $3.99. Each pack will contain the following:

Wonder if they bump Rolling Thunder up to Mythic, or just stick it at rare

Guessing this torpedos the price of Wasteland online

 

[Angry Grimace]

I like how you all just figured out that eternal formats can't really be balanced just now.

Also, lol @ Wasteland Online Set

 

[divisionbyzorro]

I like how you all just figured out that eternal formats can't really be balanced just now.

Careful. If you describe Modern as an "eternal format," there's a subset of people who are going to jump down your throat for it.

Spoiler

I.e., the most pedantic subset of people.

It comes down to what you think a "balanced" metagame should look like. If you have a wide-open metagame, then each match in a tournament is something a matchup lottery. If you have a closed metagame, then players have less agency in choosing which decks to play. Both of these have their pros and cons from a pure game design standpoint.

Also, Tempest Remastered is the strangest idea they've come up with in a long time. Especially since TSE was kind of miserable as far as draft formats go (in my opinion based on playing it something like four or five times).

 

[WanderingWind]

That's not why he's saying those cards- he's rattling off cards that all have legit T3 wins (besides Splinter Twin, which deserves to count as one anyway.) Banning Glistener Elf doesn't kill Infect. It just disables T2 nutdraws and make T3 ones easier to interact with.

It so absolutely kills infect. Deader than dead. Murderates it. I won't tell you about Twin, you don't tell me about Infect! Smilie face.

 

[Angry Grimace]

Careful. If you describe Modern as an "eternal format," there's a subset of people who are going to jump down your throat for it.

Spoiler

I.e., the most pedantic subset of people.

It comes down to what you think a "balanced" metagame should look like. If you have a wide-open metagame, then each match in a tournament is something a matchup lottery. If you have a closed metagame, then players have less agency in choosing which decks to play. Both of these have their pros and cons from a pure game design standpoint.

Also, Tempest Remastered is the strangest idea they've come up with in a long time. Especially since TSE was kind of miserable as far as draft formats go (in my opinion based on playing it something like four or five times).

Maro has already explained that they don't care about Modern and Legacy when they design new cards, ergo, so its simple logic that old sets end up being unbalanced together. Its a fun format but I think in the end, Standard remains the best competitive format, it just happens to not always be good because not every set is good.

 

[red13th]

well Modern isn't eternal, it's non-rotating.
I think they should just say fuck it and unban Legacy-level stuff like Jace, DRS and SFM.

 

[bigkrev]

My "5 minutes on Gatherer" picks for Mythics in Tempest Remastered

Aluren
Dream Halls
Ertai, Wizard Adept
Hatred
Intuition
Living Death
Mind over Matter
Rathi Dragon
Recurring Nightmare
Survival of the Fittest
Sliver Queen
Volrath’s Stronghold
City of Trators
Mox Diamond
Grindstone

 

[Angry Grimace]

Careful. If you describe Modern as an "eternal format," there's a subset of people who are going to jump down your throat for it.

Spoiler

I.e., the most pedantic subset of people.

It comes down to what you think a "balanced" metagame should look like. If you have a wide-open metagame, then each match in a tournament is something a matchup lottery. If you have a closed metagame, then players have less agency in choosing which decks to play. Both of these have their pros and cons from a pure game design standpoint.

Also, Tempest Remastered is the strangest idea they've come up with in a long time. Especially since TSE was kind of miserable as far as draft formats go (in my opinion based on playing it something like four or five times).

My "5 minutes on Gatherer" picks for Mythics in Tempest Remastered

Aluren
Dream Halls
Ertai, Wizard Adept
Hatred
Intuition
Living Death
Mind over Matter
Rathi Dragon
Recurring Nightmare
Survival of the Fittest
Sliver Queen
Volrath’s Stronghold
City of Trators
Mox Diamond
Grindstone

Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland

But seriously, Time Warp at the least is a Mythic since its been reprinted in Standard as a Mythic before. If Wasteland is still at uncommon, that's going to be an unprecedented collapse in its price.

 

[OnPoint]

Wasteland
...
Wasteland

But seriously, Time Warp at the least is a Mythic since its been reprinted in Standard as a Mythic before. If Wasteland is still at uncommon, that's going to be an unprecedented collapse in its price.

I think it will be at least a Rare.

 

[bigkrev]

Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland
Wasteland

But seriously, Time Warp at the least is a Mythic since its been reprinted in Standard as a Mythic before. If Wasteland is still at uncommon, that's going to be an unprecedented collapse in its price.

I'm guessing Wasteland is a Rare. If the set wasn't designed for limited i'd say Time Warp was in, but it's an awful limited card and has already been reprinted a bunch of times.

 

[divisionbyzorro]

If you're balancing for Limited purposes only, Wasteland is definitely not uncommon.

Also, this article from Owen basically cemented my opinion of his opinion - which is that his opinions are dumb and nobody should listen to them.

http://www.channelfireball.com/articles/the-5-best-and-5-worst-formats-of-all-time/

 

[Angry Grimace]

I think it will be at least a Rare.

It doesn't really matter though when it comes to price - they're regular priced packs and there are less card in Tempest online than in Tempest, but at the least we can assume there's a chance to get some City of Traitors here.

If you're balancing for Limited purposes only, Wasteland is definitely uncommon.

Also, this article from Owen basically cemented my opinion of his opinion - which is that his opinions are dumb and nobody should listen to them.

http://www.channelfireball.com/articles/the-5-best-and-5-worst-formats-of-all-time/

Wasteland is mostly useless in draft, I imagine. The only other thing you're going to destroy typically is what, other Wastelands?

 

[kirblar]

Rolling Thunder won't even be in the set.

 

[kirblar]

If you're balancing for Limited purposes only, Wasteland is definitely uncommon.

Also, this article from Owen basically cemented my opinion of his opinion - which is that his opinions are dumb and nobody should listen to them.

http://www.channelfireball.com/articles/the-5-best-and-5-worst-formats-of-all-time/

Aside from him liking RTR standard because he won at it a lot, he's dead on about a number of them. Team Sealed really is the best format in the game. Its much better than team drafting.

 

[divisionbyzorro]

Wasteland is mostly useless in draft, I imagine. The only other thing you're going to destroy typically is what, other Wastelands?

Yeah yeah typo fixed. *grumble grumble* I should proof what I post more often.

 

[OnPoint]

It doesn't really matter though when it comes to price - they're regular priced packs and there are less card in Tempest online than in Tempest, but at the least we can assume there's a chance to get some City of Traitors here.



Wasteland is mostly useless in draft, I imagine. The only other thing you're going to destroy typically is what, other Wastelands?

There are a ton of duals in Tempest. Not great ones by any measure, but probably draftable for fixing purposes.

 

[bigkrev]

Rolling Thunder won't even be in the set.

Yeah, but it's nice to dream!

Wasteland is mostly useless in draft, I imagine. The only other thing you're going to destroy typically is what, other Wastelands?

I'm guessing the CIPT painlands are uncommons here to provide some amount of fixing to the format (the Vec Township cycle at uncommon is complete garbage)