All B/R update speculation.

[Fox]

Pitching Needle loses a lot of playability when it has to sequentially name Oko before anything else (even if there is another good target already on board). The better card would be to play your own Oko, and that's kind of the hallmark of a poorly designed card.

[JosefK]

Can anyone point to any relevant results or data that show any problems with the metagame?

[Fox]

Can anyone point to any relevant results or data that show any problems with the metagame?

Assess metagame for the ability to punish 4c nonsense, noting that mana denial strategies are not working. While this bit is on Astrolabe, the card is not good enough by itself to be built around, nor is it good enough to justify Teferi use. The issue is that Astrolabe is these things [cantrip and mana denial-proof] *and* most importantly it's a 3/3 haste once Oko comes down which is immune to creature removal before that point. This is where you add on the bit that red blasts can't get past Veil without gifting your opponent the free 3/3, opting for destroy to play around Veil.

Not really enough time for statistics since Wrenn ban, but if you go to mtgtop8 you'll see Oko riding around 20-some percent mark.

The main thing here is that Oko turns Astro into a mana denial resistant, cantripping, pseudo-Myth Realized. That combination isn't really punishable for most decks, so you can expect any response to be more people playing Oko since they can't beat it.

[talpa]

Assess metagame for (...) 4c nonsense (...). While this bit is on Astrolabe, the card is not good enough by itself to be built around

The card that should be banned, the sooner the better, is Astrolabe.
Just check this high GP finish (37° among over 1600) by Niklas Holtmann: https://my.cfbevents.com/deck/view/1...2-3f7057730e68
FIVE COLORS WITH BLOOD MOON?!

Things have gone crazy.
Astrolabe IS too good by itself.

If you ban this soon, you could afford more time to evaluate if Veil (and Oko, which is definitely on the third place), if played only in deck which already have gone green, are oppressive on their own or not. If you wait, you'll have to ban two or even three cards at a time.

Astrolabe is "THE" offender.

I remember a time when people whined about fetchlands. Now something that lets everybody play five colors should be fine? Lol, I don't care about numbers, WOTC looks at the MTGO metagame which is not the same as the paper one. I look at the play experience and it's awful what this card does (of course now I too am playing it because I "have" to) and it's completely unfair.

[BirdsOfParadise]

I remember a time when people whined about fetchlands. Now something that lets everybody play five colors should be fine?

To be fair to past discussions, keep in mind that Astrolabe is not the only card enabling the deck that you indicated to play five colors while having enough basics to run Blood Moon. The deck's 10 fetch lands can each fetch any color of mana or fetch a basic Island, as needed. If the problem is five-color decks with Blood Moon, recognize all the cards that make such decks viable.

[talpa]

To be fair to past discussions, keep in mind that Astrolabe is not the only card enabling the deck that you indicated to play five colors while having enough basics to run Blood Moon. The deck's 10 fetch lands can each fetch any color of mana or fetch a basic Island, as needed. If the problem is five-color decks with Blood Moon, recognize all the cards that make such decks viable.

Maybe I shouldn't have dig out again that thing, but fetchlands aren't really the main problem here and clearly Astrolabe is; simple "proof" is, nobody ever played competitively -that I know of- five colours good stuff when fetchlands were available and astrolabe wasn't there (with deathrite -now banned- they played four colours), let alone five colors AND blood moon together.

My reference to past discussion was a little provocative but it was meant to say: if people complained about fetchlands, why the hell aren't they complaining now against Astrolabe?
Instead and before speaking of Veil or Oko, I'd expect them to be very vocal against Astrolabe.

[Fox]

There is a difference between enabling 4-5c and 4-5c being a good deck at the same time. The card is not competitive without Wrenn or Oko, and no deck using Astrolabe without either of those has done anything. The closest you could get is UWr Snow Mentor, which is an underwhelming midrange deck.

So here’s the thing with Astro, you need to count the slots:
-20 lands
-20 more with playsets of FoW, BS, Ponder, Astro, Bolt/Plow/removals.
-around 4 walkers, 3 Snapcaster, 2 Kcomm, 3-4 discard, 2 Plague Engi, and ~5 slots of whatever.

Congrats on your mana fixing, but your deck doesn’t really have a wincon (b/c Astrolabes can’t turn into hasted 3/3s with Oko gone, which is how these decks win). This is the little inconvenient truth people forget with Astrolabe, it just isn’t actually a thing without Oko.

What we do know is the stated reason why Wrenn got banned [to nerf RUG Delver]. What we also know is exactly what happens with BUG Delver if Astrolabe gets the axe - it becomes tier 1 (or better) being by far the best remaining Oko deck. There’s no point in banning Delver out of being the best deck in the format, just to boost it back to where it was with a different color.

[talpa]

The card is not competitive without Wrenn or Oko, and no deck using Astrolabe without either of those has done anything

The first is just your thoughts (which I think it's obviously wrong: as if perfect mana fixing at no cost apart from having a deck with less than 60 slots maindeck -but hey! that's un upside too) supported by a false reasoning in the second sentence. Of course you haven't seen a deck with Astrolabe without Oko because Oko is strong, you can add it at no cost once you have Astrolabe. But that's not proof of Oko being OP nor of Astrolabe being not OP, simply because nobody has ever experienced a situation with only one of them being legal.

You say Astrolabe without Oko wouldn't be a thing. I say that if you can still play discard, swords to plowshares, veil of summer, and red elemental blast in your blue deck at no cost, you'd still continue to do so.

On the contrary, Oko without astrolabe could be played only in deck that are already green.
(BTW show on the doll where BUG delver has hurt you)
It would be impossible to mantain either plowshares (response to your dreadful delver) and red blasts too (answers to Oko). So your opponent could have answers against your threats that your Oko-without-Astrolabe deck wouldn't against theirs.

As for the WOTC apparent reasoning in bannings.
I have already said I don't care what numbers on MTGO say. MTGO meta is different from real. For example, if you never had dominance of Astrolabe-Veil-Oko online (I'm saying IF) because combo deck kept it in check, that would mean nothing for paper magic if combo in real has not the same presence of online.

(Oh. PS:

Congrats on your mana fixing, but your deck doesn’t really have a wincon

That's called a control deck, proudly from 1994. You can have just 1-2 win cons, and yes, Jace ultimate for example could count -back in the days landeed won only on that and Mishra- and you listed 4 pw - more than enough. Also "circa 5 slots of whatever" seems plenty of space to me)

[Fox]

Have to bring you to task on this on @Talpa: it’s beyond pointless to ban Wrenn to hurt Delver, if you’re going to turn around and hand the format right back to Delver.

The only reason Astrolabe is good enough to compete is that nobody can cast a JTMS or other not-Oko walker into an Astrolabe and activate for value, as their opponent will untap and immediately dome that PW with a haste 3/3. You don’t get to lose 4 slots of deck space and sit behind a JTMS and compete in legacy, see also Gitaxian Probe and how it never made JTMS a wincon.

You are missing the most important interactions in your assessment. When it comes to Blood Moon decks, the reason they are failing is that their opening play (Sol Land -> Chalice) is a 1 turn penalty. Once the opponent reaches 3 mana Oko is free to go [+1] at any point and time walk the Moon player. Also note that ignoring Chalice means the Moon player will march their next spell right into a tempo swing (FoW). You can pretend Astro is the key here, but all of those Moon decks run Karn, so....

[Lord_Mcdonalds]

Tell us again about how CB and hymn are going to terrorize the format

[Fox]

Tell us again about how CB and hymn are going to terrorize the format

It’s pretty funny that people are too scared of a SB card (Veil) to cast a Hymn, yes. Also funny that the cost of having access to the anti-Hymn card takes away all the slots for CB (Oko + Astro).

Will it stay this way though...probably not; Oko is getting banned, and deep down everyone knows it. I’ve been pleasantly surprised by the continued absence of Hymn/CB even after the exit of Wrenn, but this interlude will come to an end unfortunately. It has become increasingly apparent that the only way for most decks to beat Oko is to include him.

[Watersaw]

There is a difference between enabling 4-5c and 4-5c being a good deck at the same time. The card is not competitive without Wrenn or Oko, and no deck using Astrolabe without either of those has done anything. The closest you could get is UWr Snow Mentor, which is an underwhelming midrange deck.

So here’s the thing with Astro, you need to count the slots:
-20 lands
-20 more with playsets of FoW, BS, Ponder, Astro, Bolt/Plow/removals.
-around 4 walkers, 3 Snapcaster, 2 Kcomm, 3-4 discard, 2 Plague Engi, and ~5 slots of whatever.

Congrats on your mana fixing, but your deck doesn’t really have a wincon (b/c Astrolabes can’t turn into hasted 3/3s with Oko gone, which is how these decks win). This is the little inconvenient truth people forget with Astrolabe, it just isn’t actually a thing without Oko.

What we do know is the stated reason why Wrenn got banned [to nerf RUG Delver]. What we also know is exactly what happens with BUG Delver if Astrolabe gets the axe - it becomes tier 1 (or better) being by far the best remaining Oko deck. There’s no point in banning Delver out of being the best deck in the format, just to boost it back to where it was with a different color.

There HAS to be another card besides a 2019 planeswalker that can act as a threat in those slots. TNN? Dack maybe?
At any rate there's a greater-than-zero chance we'll wind up in this same mess again even if something does get banned so at some point we need to terms with that, given good card selection, good mana, and good 2-3 cmc spells, 5 color control will eventually be good unless games routinely end on turn 2. Is this a bad thing?

[talpa]

1) it’s beyond pointless to ban Wrenn to hurt Delver
2) nobody can cast a JTMS or other not-Oko walker
3) You are missing the most important interactions in your assessment. When it comes to Blood Moon decks

Maybe I have troubles explaining myself in english since I'm not native spekaer, but I was pretty sure I never said Red Stompy decks were kept in check by Astrolabe.
I just said I find awful you can play five colours AND blood moon IN THE VERY SAME deck.

As for 1 and 2
1) WOTC never said they wanted to hurt "delver". There is plenty of diverse flavours of delver.deck and the problem, if we believe them, was that a very specific one of them was having a win percentage too high. I suspect the most important reason was the "meta-warping" effect Wrenn was having (like, you couldn't play 1 thoughness creatures).
2) I may be mistaken, but I was pretty sure I have seen Oko and Jace together almost in every list.

Edit: since it's star wars time again

[Fox]

As for 1 and 2
1) WOTC never said they wanted to hurt "delver". There is plenty of diverse flavours of delver.deck and the problem, if we believe them, was that a very specific one of them was having a win percentage too high. I suspect the most important reason was the "meta-warping" effect Wrenn was having (like, you couldn't play 1 thoughness creatures).
2) I may be mistaken, but I was pretty sure I have seen Oko and Jace together almost in every list.

Actually no, the Moon decks are dying b/c Chalice on 1 is a losing play. Now they certainly have a harder time winning with a Moon cheese by itself due to more basics...but again why is that not resolving if it matters hmm? Oh that's right, you don't have to counter a Chalice if you're just going to Elk it at your leisure in two turns.

You have to recognize that opening Chalice is a self minus one turn, and Chalice openers are where the power of those decks lie. If you're really struggling with that concept, read Karn then read Astrolabe, and note how he's in Moon decks...so actually Astrolabe doesn't actually explain the phenomenon you're describing.

On the second part, you are correct - you can't play JTMS and compete unless you play Oko...b/c if you play JTMS into an Astrolabe vs. an Oko-user, you actually can't use BS-mode b/c *if* Oko comes down on their turn, you're out a PW. The ability to turn Astrolabe into a 3/3 haste (again, haste b/c it's already been on the field) is the entire problem; which is why Oko is getting banned soon.


To walk that one out for you: for most decks you can't play walkers not called Oko, without also playing your own Oko b/c of this turning Astrolabe into an immediate punish of any [freshly-cast] PW. That first activation has to make value and put said PW outside of 3/3 kill range; this is not really a thing PWs do at legacy costs.

Edit: to walk it out for you even further, JTMS + Astrolabe without Oko is not a thing. It won't be a thing after Oko is banned b/c again, it's not a thing.

On Wrenn:
"Prior to the addition of Wrenn and Six to Temur Delver decks, the Legacy metagame was generally looking healthy. In order to weaken Temur Delver decks and bring the metagame into a better balance again, Wrenn and Six is banned in Legacy."
^banned to hurt Delver.

[Seymour_Asses]

I wasn't on the 'Labe train before but I think I'm buying a ticket.

Five-color mana fixing that replaces itself and lets you play B2B/Blood Moon is probably too good.

Oko is a pain in the ass with high loyalty who can +1 to defend himself OR turn your opponent's best artifact/creature into a useless elk, but as long as they print some better PW removal I can see him sticking around.

Veil is super powerful but the only reason I can see it getting the banhammer is for making fast combo invincible (which it certainly isn't doing now). As someone who plays a lot of discard I'm just going to have to suck it up.

[Fox]

I wasn't on the 'Labe train before but I think I'm buying a ticket.

So we're going to bring this back up: we just banned Wrenn b/c Delver was too good. So you want to ban a card that will make BUG Delver the best Oko deck and put it right back to where RUG Delver was. So, if that's your play why did we even bother banning Wrenn if we're just going to boost Delver right back to where it was?

[Seymour_Asses]

So we're going to bring this back up: we just banned Wrenn b/c Delver was too good. So you want to ban a card that will make BUG Delver the best Oko deck and put it right back to where RUG Delver was. So, if that's your play why did we even bother banning Wrenn if we're just going to boost Delver right back to where it was?

Man, I don't know what flavor of Kool-Aid you're drinking but you might want to take it easy.

[Fox]

Man, I don't know what flavor of Kool-Aid you're drinking but you might want to take it easy.

I think it's a fair question, and it's merely asked directly. You've listed off things Astrolabe technically can do, but what's the deck that has done this to any effect without using Wrenn and/or Oko? This is a slot-intensive investment, so what are those 20 other 4-5c cards that are gonna shape the landscape of legacy (recall 20 land, 20 spots of FoW/BS/Ponder/Astro/1cmc removal)?

[kombatkiwi]

I think it's a fair question, and it's merely asked directly. You've listed off things Astrolabe technically can do, but what's the deck that has done this to any effect without using Wrenn and/or Oko? This is a slot-intensive investment, so what are those 20 other 4-5c cards that are gonna shape the landscape of legacy (recall 20 land, 20 spots of FoW/BS/Ponder/Astro/1cmc removal)?

So we're going to bring this back up: we just banned Wrenn b/c Delver was too good. So you want to ban a card that will make BUG Delver the best Oko deck and put it right back to where RUG Delver was. So, if that's your play why did we even bother banning Wrenn if we're just going to boost Delver right back to where it was?

Wrenn was banned because the best wrenn deck was too good. The fact it happened to be a delver deck is immaterial.
BUG Delver may or may not be the best Oko deck without astrolabe; even if it does become the best Oko deck, that is still not a guarantee that it dominates the metagame to the extent that wrenn delver did.

The reason why no deck has popped up using astrolabe without oko/wrenn is that once you have Astro in your deck there isn't any drawback to splashing these powerful multicolour cards, so of course the successful versions of these multicolour control decks are playing them because to not do so would be choosing to play a deck that is almost strictly inferior. This doesn't mean that without Oko/Wrenn the decks wouldn't exist at all in some capacity: midrange durdle pile deck clearly existed before wrenn/oko was a thing and it seems reasonable that the best version of that deck without either of those two Planeswalkers would be a multicolour deck with astrolabe

-20 lands
-20 more with playsets of FoW, BS, Ponder, Astro, Bolt/Plow/removals.
-around 4 walkers, 3 Snapcaster, 2 Kcomm, 3-4 discard, 2 Plague Engi, and ~5 slots of whatever.

Like how is that not a totally reasonable deck
Snapcaster is a wincon, the PWs can be a wincon, Plague Engineer is not essential in any way, "5 slots of whatever" is a lot of room to play with. If it gets you a deck with the ability to play UWGR(b?) with 3 mana teferi, Coatl, Jace, Plow, Veil, Pyroblast etc that seems worth

To be clear, I currently don't support the banning of either Astrolabe or Oko
I just think that the idea of "Astro decks without Oko are unplayable and if you ban only Astrolabe then BUG Delver becomes tier zero" is stupid
If anything I think I would probably ban veil because it seems to lead to the least enjoyable play patterns, but I haven't played enough since the Wrenn ban to really have a strong opinion on it

[talpa]

Actually no, the Moon decks are dying b/c Chalice on 1 is a losing play (...)
You have to recognize (...)
If you're really struggling with that concept (...)
Astrolabe doesn't actually explain the phenomenon you're describing

Man, in the comment you were replying to I had just told you I was not speaking of moon deck at all! LOL
I just cited in my reasoning moon IN the five colours good stuff deck
If you struggle with basic comprehension of your language, I'll avoid discussing magic with you