View Poll Results: Most bannable card in Legacy? (not that they will touch it)

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  • Brainstorm

    16 8.33%
  • Force of Will

    4 2.08%
  • Lion's Eye Diamond

    35 18.23%
  • Counterbalance

    34 17.71%
  • Sensei's Divining Top

    103 53.65%
  • Tarmogoyf

    46 23.96%
  • Phyrexian Dreadnaught

    2 1.04%
  • Goblin Lackey

    4 2.08%
  • Standstill

    6 3.13%
  • Natural Order

    8 4.17%
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Thread: All B/R update speculation.

  1. #21341
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    Re: All B/R update speculation.

    just pointing out that their continued viability (as well as that of straight-UW) are tied directly to either: Terminus being legal or Terminus & Vial both being banned.
    Strongly disagree. Their viability is not tied to Terminus.

    Quote Originally Posted by Fox View Post
    Right now Cavern/Vial can get wrath’d too thanks to Terminus. Were Terminus banned you would have 2 options: play dude deck that can be wrath’d or play dude deck that can’t be wrath’d. One of those new choices is unambiguously better than the other.
    You're equating the creature deck's viability with whether the opponent can resolve Wrath. That's a false equivalence. They're not the same. Resolving Wrath doesn't determine the game. Dozens if not hundreds of dude decks can either outrace Wrath, discard Wrath, or reliably win through 1-2 Wraths resolved. In the end, the deck that can get Wrathed might actually have a better win % against control than D&T would.

    I used to play a lot of semi-competitive "casual" Magic on the side. Random creature feature decks do really well against control. Wrath of God and Counterspell don't stop them. Since Lorwyn block, Wizards made creatures surprisingly resilient (ETB value, Persist, Undying, LTB triggers, 2-for-1 creatures, Flash, Haste, Dauntless Escort/Selfless Spirit-type protections, army-in-a-can threats). You can also play around Wrath by not vomiting your whole hand on the board. Look at Modern and different Standard formats over time. Wraths don't make random creature decks not viable.

    Here's a casual example of an aggro deck that doesn't mind if you have Wraths.


    //Creatures: 30
    4 Carrion Feeder
    4 Gravecrawler
    4 Cryptbreaker
    4 Relentless Dead
    2 Plaguebearer
    4 Midnight Reaper
    4 Geralf's Messenger
    4 Lord of the Undead

    //Spells: 8
    4 Thoughtseize
    4 Fatal Push

    //Lands: 22
    3 Volrath's Stronghold
    19 Swamp


    If Terminus was banned, this deck isn't going to lose in Legacy because of 4 mana Wraths. It'll get wrecked by unfair combo decks. Unfair cards are what push out most creature feature decks, not wraths. (I agree Counterbalance is unfair, though much weaker without Top)

    You'll probably say this is some exception because of the graveyard recursion, but that's just one of many angles. I can spend all day posting casual creature decks (without blue cards or Vial) that beat generic UW control using 4 mana Wraths.

    If you made a Legacy format where all combos were banned and it was only fair decks (control, aggro, tempo, midrange), random creature feature would be just as viable if not even more viable than D&T. That's what kitchen table Magic looks like. Most of those decks are just garbage in Legacy because they have no game against unfair decks.

    Vial is not the problem because slowing down Wraths is not the limiting issue.

  2. #21342
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    Re: All B/R update speculation.

    We're gonna have to agree to disagree then; the biggest risk to any flood the board strategy is losing all your guys to one spell. When you have a dude deck that is already competitive (mostly talking about DnT here) and suddenly can't really lose to Tundra (particularly in G1, and can't realistically lose to straight-UW miracles in any game), I don't think you can choose a creature deck with a ~10% worse position in the meta.

    We can name off decks that are better against destroy wraths, but that doesn't mean they're viable. Your deck for instance can't do a thing about resolved Elesh Norn, it also probably can't ever beat the card Show and Tell - but this kind of stuff isn't the point. Banning Terminus doesn't make that a competitive option. When you look at Terminus you really have to step back and ask "what is the mechanism by which someone can play 7-8 completely non-proactive white cards preboard." The specifics of how much Terminus costs and what zones it sends things too is annoying, but it's just not that broken. As bad as it feels to get Terminus'd, the card hits Cavern/Vial too - so they aren't just the better way to play dude strats. It's not like the non-Cavern/Vial dude decks are going to like the instant speed 3 mana white wrath any more than Terminus [which they'd have to eventually print to address getting to a main phase vs Vial enabling Wasteland/Port/Thalia].

    It's fine to be in the ban Terminus camp, but you can't really be there and not be looking at Vial at the same time. You have to connect the dots to get to the wrath color needs to be able to wrath, b/c it's one of the few things the color is supposed to be able to do by design. When a white deck has to splash to get a cast'able wrath, that's not okay.

  3. #21343
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    Re: All B/R update speculation.

    Quote Originally Posted by Fox View Post
    the biggest risk to any flood the board strategy is losing all your guys to one spell.
    No, the biggest risk is Goblin Charbelcher, followed by Tendrils of Agony, Emrakul, the Aeons Torn and Griselbrand.

    Board wipes are less scary. Aggro doesn't flood unless it's racing. Against slow control you play 2-3 threats and hold the rest in hand. Aggro plays 24-30 threats. UW may have 8 1-for-1s and 4 wipes. You have more threats than they have answers as long as you don't walk into a 5-for-1. In old Legacy, Zoo beat Tundra.

    Value creatures (anything that lets you break parity at a 1 for 1 trade) tip the scales even more against the board wipe (e.g. Kitchen Finks, Voice of Resurgence, Thragtusk, Hangarback Walker, Bloodbraid Elf, Dark Confidant, Stoneforge Mystic, Bitterblossom, Goblin Ringleader). Losing 2-3 cards to 1 spell becomes a minor setback.


    When you have a dude deck that is already competitive (mostly talking about DnT here) and suddenly can't really lose to Tundra
    Budget Goblins (without Port/Waste) would still beat Tundra. It's not the mana denial but Goblin Ringleader and hastelords. UW can't present enough answers. That's how 30-creature decks beat Tundra.

    Banning Terminus doesn't make that a competitive option.
    Huh? I don't want Terminus banned. It's not broken. Tuck vs destroy is tangential (I posted a GY deck by coincidence, could have been tokens or 2-for-1s). I'm just arguing Vial has nothing to do with it.

    Even if D&T becomes 10% better against Tundra, it won't make D&T 10% better or the only creature deck. D&T is a prison strategy and occupies a different meta space than aggro would. Creature deck viability will depend on matchups against the entire rest of the metagame (e.g. D&T, Delver, combo), not the Tundra matchup. Tundra is a small part and not their worst matchup.

    We can name off decks that are better against destroy wraths, but that doesn't mean they're viable. Your deck for instance can't do a thing about resolved Elesh Norn, it also probably can't ever beat the card Show and Tell
    Exactly. That's why it's not viable. Can't beat unfair strategies like cheatyfaces. Unfair matchups are what determine a creature deck's viability, not how they do against Tundra. It's easy to build creature decks that both race other creature decks and beat Tundra, but most of them lose to unfair decks. It's hard to make creature decks that don't scoop to unfair decks. Viability against unfair decks is the limiting factor. "Viable" non-blue creature strategies become mana denial (D&T) or hatebears (e.g. Maverick) or Chalice.

    Zoo is obsolete because Zoo will never beat Griselbrand or ANT, not because Tundra could resolve Wrath.

  4. #21344
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    Re: All B/R update speculation.

    Creature feature decks abandoned the stack, of course they have bad matchups vs decks that require interaction in that zone. This is a separate issue not tied to Terminus.

    The concept of a wrath is to stop going wide with dudes, and overcommiting to the battlefield zone. The wrath concept is a dominant aspect of white. It is the most direct answer to a dude deck's proactive plan. Not having meaningful interaction is different than running into brick walls (wraths) built especially for you.

    A talk about Terminus is not about fair dudes troubles with combo. The only thing to note there is that in the absence of Counterbalance, wrath decks have to play more blue cards and cut white ones. While it might feel bad to lose to a combo deck, they are your friend b/c they force control to knock it off with the white card pre-boarding.

    So if you ban Terminus white can't wrath Cavern/Vial dude decks with white cards. There would exist dude decks the color will fail to be able to wrath, despite wrath being the whole point of running white - this deficit would owe entirely to Vial. It's not about being able to come up with some list that could have a good matchup vs UW, it's that they can't reasonably cast a wrath - like just being able to cast one, regardless of outcome, against a strategy wrath is explicitly designed to hit.

    I'm not talking about x can beat y, I'm talking about the fundamental failure of a color when we fail to link Terminus to Vial.

  5. #21345
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    Re: All B/R update speculation.

    Not to mention the fact that 4 Mana wrath of God and verdict aren't the only sweepers. Pyroclasm, Kozileks Return, EE, Firespout and all sorts of things exist. God forbid you actually have to think about your removal suite and hedge a little bit instead of just tossing in 4 Terminus and calling it a day
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    Top quality german restraint there.

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  6. #21346
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    Re: All B/R update speculation.

    Quote Originally Posted by FTW View Post
    Zoo is obsolete because Zoo will never beat Griselbrand or ANT, not because Tundra could resolve Wrath.
    I agree with all that you say except for this last part: traditional Zoo (read: Naya, be it fast or big) is obsolete because now the best aggro creature is delver, and nemesis brickwalls you. (Please note this comes from a blue and brainstorm lover).


    On a very different theme: how comes instead of this boring discussion on D&T and Terminus nobody is speaking of the new possible mulligan rule and the impacts it could have on eternal?



    (I'd say, potentially devastating)


  7. #21347
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    Re: All B/R update speculation.

    Quote Originally Posted by talpa View Post
    I agree with all that you say except for this last part: traditional Zoo (read: Naya, be it fast or big) is obsolete because now the best aggro creature is delver, and nemesis brickwalls you. (Please note this comes from a blue and brainstorm lover).
    Yeah Delver was the nail in the coffin. Though I'd argue Delver of Secrets made Wild Nacatl obsolete because blue aggro has much better matchups against unfair decks than green aggro, so pure aggro is almost strictly worse than playing Delver. Zoo can beat Delver, but Delver beats more things than Zoo can.

    nobody is speaking of the new possible mulligan rule and the impacts it could have on eternal?
    Who needs Serum Powder? Vintage Dredge becomes OP. They have 7*7=49 chances to see Bazaar instead of 7+6+5+4+3+2+1=28, almost doubly as effective.

    In Legacy, combo also gets way better because you get to see more cards each mulligan before making a decision, and you get to pitch the worst cards. This mulligan rule is probably for Standard and Limited players to avoid manascrew, but it's clearly broken for unfair decks in Eternal. Rather than ban cards, they should just not apply the rule.

  8. #21348
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    Re: All B/R update speculation.

    Quote Originally Posted by FTW View Post
    Yeah Delver was the nail in the coffin. Though I'd argue Delver of Secrets made Wild Nacatl obsolete because blue aggro has much better matchups against unfair decks than green aggro, so pure aggro is almost strictly worse than playing Delver. Zoo can beat Delver, but Delver beats more things than Zoo can.



    Who needs Serum Powder? Vintage Dredge becomes OP. They have 7*7=49 chances to see Bazaar instead of 7+6+5+4+3+2+1=28, almost doubly as effective.

    In Legacy, combo also gets way better because you get to see more cards each mulligan before making a decision, and you get to pitch the worst cards. This mulligan rule is probably for Standard and Limited players to avoid manascrew, but it's clearly broken for unfair decks in Eternal. Rather than ban cards, they should just not apply the rule.
    Bazzar is super crucial for Vintage dredge.

    But imagine legacy, when your opponent always have BS or FoW in his hand.
    Blind Therapy will be such an ass wipe on the play against blue decks.

  9. #21349
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    Re: All B/R update speculation.

    Quote Originally Posted by Matsu View Post
    But imagine legacy, when your opponent always have BS or FoW in his hand.
    Blind Therapy will be such an ass wipe on the play against blue decks.
    I still think the edge goes to combo. In fair blue decks, most cards are roughly equal quality. You don't know which you'll need for the match until the game starts playing out. You can smooth basic things like the ratio of cantrips to threats to answers, but that's it. That's why the optimal Brainstorm isn't on turn 1 but some time later, with more information revealed.

    In unfair decks, the card quality is much more assymetrical. You clearly want some cards more than other cards, or in certain combinations. Getting to sculpt your best 6 or 5 is very strong. SneakShow and ANT will be happy.

  10. #21350

    Re: All B/R update speculation.

    I actually disagree on the combo decks, most of them. Decks that don't mulligan agressively today like ANT/SnS/Depths, are decks that have a number of tutors/cantrips to make it function enough with most 7-opening. Today's lists of those decks do not get that much benefit from the new mulligan, if you have a 7-card good hand would you mulligan agressively to a t1 combo hand? Probably not because those decks don't go off t1 higher than like 15% of the time. If you keep a t2 hand with ANT/SnS/Depths on a mull to 5/4, and opponent has a t1 disruption its awful. What can happen is new lists that use more combo pieces and less cantrips/tutors, which seems bad for the format.

    What can happen, and I will not like it, are decks that today mulligan more agressively and can work with limited resources if they are the right resources like Moon Stompy/RB Reanimator. Reanimator is less of a problem because g2/g3 we can mulligan for hate much easier, but its still a non-game much bigger that it creates than it is today, g1 they win even a higher % of the time, g2/g3 we mull to oblivion for hate and they mull to oblivion to find combo + answer. What this can lead to is an increase in decks that are more incosistent and do not attack from an easily hateable side. It really doesn't seem like this will improve the format, it looks worse if they really keep that mulligan rule.

  11. #21351
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    Re: All B/R update speculation.

    Yeah I kind of agree, kind of disagree. The rule isn't just for mulls to oblivion. It has other benefits too.

    I'll break this into cases:

    1) Decks that greedily mull to oblivion to find an "I win card", e.g. Vintage Dredge. Of course these get stupidly better.

    2) High variance explosive decks that need to see certain cards or the hand is unplayable: Belcher, AllSpells, LED Dredge, BR Reanimator (i.e. combo without cantrips). You would never mull a decent 7. However, if your 7 sucks the chances of getting a winning 5 or 6 get higher than under normal rules. You see more information before deciding to mulligan, and you get the option to sculpt and keep the best cards. These decks get a free win rate boost by losing to themselves less often, since variance is one of their biggest weaknesses.

    3) Combo with cantrips: SneakShow, ANT, TES, UB Reanimator, High Tide, Aluren, etc. These decks already have less variance. Due to cantrips, you already have the ability to recover from bad openers or dig for pieces, so there are fewer garbage hands to begin with. With the new rule you do get slightly more information when deciding whether to mull your 6, and you need to mull that 6 less often. Because you're combo, you can use the extra information well because you know what cards you want to see and what cards you don't want to see. Overall, there's a small gain but not as much.

    4) Fair decks. These decks also get slightly more information when deciding what to do with a 6. The problem is fair decks don't really know what cards they want to see until a few turns play out. Their game plan may vary depending on what the opponent is doing. This is why turn 1 Brainstorm is bad and later Brainstorms are better. Fair decks make suboptimal decisions about what cards they need to sculpt until the game develops more. Fair decks can still use the rule for basic things in a 5 or 6 - fixing the number of lands or making sure you have a threat - but beyond that they are more likely to sculpt suboptimally than a combo deck is. They'll just do what Standard and Limited decks will do (i.e. a fair use of the rule to avoid manascrew).

    What can happen is new lists that use more combo pieces and less cantrips/tutors, which seems bad for the format.
    Also this, basically case 2. High-variance combo has the most to gain.

  12. #21352
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    Re: All B/R update speculation.

    I think everyone has played games vs the cantrip decks where they had to mull to 5 with a cantrip and lost. This just helps those hands as well since they can keep a 2 land hand where before they likely are to be stuck starting with 1.
    -rob

  13. #21353
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    Re: All B/R update speculation.

    Announcement today, predictions?
    Brainstorm Realist

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  14. #21354

    Re: All B/R update speculation.

    Quote Originally Posted by Mr. Safety View Post
    Announcement today, predictions?
    Absolutely zero changes.

  15. #21355

    Re: All B/R update speculation.

    Unban Frantich search. One can hope

  16. #21356
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    Re: All B/R update speculation.

    Quote Originally Posted by Mr. Safety View Post
    Announcement today, predictions?
    Either nothing or Modern: Ban faithless looting / unban stoneforge mystic.

  17. #21357
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    Re: All B/R update speculation.

    My prediction, as always:

    Legacy - Mind Twist, Earthcraft unbanned

    Modern is in a weird spot with Faithless Looting decks taking up a full 30%+ of day 2 decks at GPLA. It could change drastically in the next few events, but it's recognized by most, including LSV, as the best card in modern. I hope they don't ban it, we need something inherently good at smoothing out decks in modern. Maybe a SFM unban to balance it out? Plus with Modern Horizons coming up soon I think they would want to see what that does for the format before prematurely banning Looting

    Modern - SFM unbanned

    Ever the optimist, I think these are fair but unlikely. Fingers crossed.
    Brainstorm Realist

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  18. #21358

    Re: All B/R update speculation.

    No change, but a boat of spoilers arrive. Please.

  19. #21359

    Re: All B/R update speculation.

    My prediction:

    Hermit Druid unbanned

    Chalice of the Void players banned by DCI

  20. #21360
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    Re: All B/R update speculation.

    No changes to any format

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