1. I think if Wizards fills the creature pool right, the theoretical 6CMC cards I'm suggesting wouldn't always be the game ending threat the titans proved to usually be. They could help lock it up, but they don't HAVE to be the end of the world. I'd like to think the 5CMC creatures wouldn't be too far behind in power level. Even something like Huntmaster at 4CMC was awesome way back when. People could build decks that don't have 6CMC or 5CMC at all if the power can be spread properly across the 4 and lower tiers.
However, the haymakers don't have to be creatures. They can be anything. I still say Elspeth is a modern-day titan. Planeswalkers are totally viable finishers.
My problem is that since the titans, they seem to be scared to print anything of consequence at 6 CMC in higher numbers. Landing a huge threat is empowering. It makes you feel like you're doing something devastating. But people are winning now by Pack Ratting and Master of Waving and Fleecemane Lioning all over the place. It just doesn't have that same feeling to me right now.
This is why I'm so disappointed by the Gods. What a letdown.
2. In terms of your price issues, make them available at rare, or even put them in intro packs or something, and give Mythics a reason to exist. Let's stop using Mythic as a limited balancing mechanic and instead create unique cards that do crazy shit.
3. I personally don't think Counterspell was overpowered at UU. I think it was the crazy amount of other counters they printed around it that made it seem that way. Things like Mana Leak are busted. Counterspell forces you into heavy blue. UU is pretty restrictive. Countering spells is something they've really cut back on in terms of power, though.
4. Cryptic should have been UUUU. And even then it's probably still too good. I do, however, think it's funny that most of the balance issues you're talking about there are blue. Shock vs Lightning Bolt is really a call by Wizards on how they want to build Standard, btw. We'll see Bolt in standard again someday.
1- I didn't mean to argue just about 6 CMC creatures, but more about not printing cards that are considerably better than every other option at their CMC and also command an overpowering presence compared to other cards, mostly due to the raw power, usefulness and/or sheer versatility they provide. Unless you're very certain of using a certain metagame card to hate on a deck or card that you predict will be everywhere, most of the time you'll end up running the cards that maximize your chances of winning against as many archetypes as possible, therefore restricting your choices to one or two cards tops, all of which are probably going to be in high demand due to being universally useful.
2- Yeah, I believe that mythics should do crazier things more often. For example, I loved Mirror-Mad Phantasm despite how the current combat damage rules relegated it to junk mythic status (damage using the stack would've made it at least somewhat viable). Quirky mythics like that feel a lot better to me than ones which break limited games in half but don't offer anything for constructed players.
3- I was trying to imply not that Counterspell was too good, but that having it in standard would automatically place a stranglehold on what other counters they could print alongside it. More splashable counters are indeed worse for the game's well-being than ones that cost lots of blue mana, but moving the baseline counterspell to 1UU: Counter + small benefit looks like a good thing.
That reminds me how Psychic Strike ended up not being that much of an issue despite it only costing a single blue mana, contrary to a poster's speculation. Could that mean we're more likely to see 1CD counterspells in the near future?
4- Yeah, CC is the single command that's an instant, as well as the one that costs the least (outside of Profane, which costs XBB and could be cast for 3 mana), which combined with the usefulness of its many modes made it into quite the figurative swiss army knife. Then, there're cards such as Bitterblossom, where players at first were debating whether a 1/1 flier each turn was better or worse than a card drawn by Phyrexian Arena, and then they finally realized how well it worked alongside Lorwyn's tribal theme and how much that lower mana cost mattered (it probably helped that faeries had acces to Thoughtseize and Cryptic Command at the time as well).
Basically, I'd say scaling down the average power of both creatures and cards which answer creatures could lead to more granularity in the designs they can come up with, in the same way that settling on a baseline of 2 damage for R let them print 3 damage for 1R, which would've made a lot less sense had Lighting Bolt been in standard at the time. It's true that they could eventually move the baseline cost:effect ratio around back into LB's area, but that also depends on how tough the creatures are at the time.
