All B/R update speculation.

[Mr Miagi]

Which aggro do you speak of?

[Quasim0ff]

Which aggro do you speak of?

You could argue that Delver is a legacy-iteration of aggro. A deck that focuses on the early game, with reach.

No, Delver is not zoo - hence the "non-linear" statement.

[Mr Miagi]

well, aggro is pretty much gone from legacy.

By all definitions I would consider delver a tempo deck, regardless if ti runs wasteland or not.

[MGB]

I think they should ban Thespian's Stage or Dark Depths.

RG Lands is simply too powerful a deck right now with this combo available to them. If they had to play the deck the way it used to be played pre-combo (i.e. strong but slower control deck that grinds them out with Barbarian Ring, or Mindslaver, or man-lands) it would still be strong but not nearly the best or second best deck in the format it is right now.

I'm completely serious when I say this. Lands crushes everything that isn't fast combo, and then boards into a sideboard full of hate for that combo *and* can combo out with its Marit Lage token fast enough to beat combo in one turn. The only thing that is stopping Lands from dominating every tournament is simply the lack of people playing the deck for various reasons (bias toward blue, lack of Tabernacles, etc).

[Lemnear]

well, aggro is pretty much gone from legacy.

By all definitions I would consider delver a tempo deck, regardless if ti runs wasteland or not.

You know that "tempo" is a Legacy-exclusive, blue subtype of the Aggro-concept, like the kinda outdated term of "sligh" is for "cheap, efficient creatures paired with burn spells"?

[Barook]

I think they should ban Thespian's Stage or Dark Depths.

RG Lands is simply too powerful a deck right now with this combo available to them. If they had to play the deck the way it used to be played pre-combo (i.e. strong but slower control deck that grinds them out with Barbarian Ring, or Mindslaver, or man-lands) it would still be strong but not nearly the best or second best deck in the format it is right now.

I'm completely serious when I say this. Lands crushes everything that isn't fast combo, and then boards into a sideboard full of hate for that combo *and* can combo out with its Marit Lage token fast enough to beat combo in one turn. The only thing that is stopping Lands from dominating every tournament is simply the lack of people playing the deck for various reasons (bias toward blue, lack of Tabernacles, etc).

If it's powerful enough, it's going to show its raw power sooner or later. People not properly metagaming for it can also be a reason why it does well. Player experience is also a thing.

[FoolofaTook]

Fastbond + Crucible of Worlds+any otherwise marginally playable self-sacrifice land like fetchland, wasteland, ghost quarter, cephalid coliseum, crystal vein, horizon canopy, archealogical dig, or city of traitors
is pretty derpy.

For example,
T1: Forest -> Fastbond -> Crystal Vein, Wasteland, Crucible of Worlds ... hard cast Emrakul.

There's no draw in that sequence so you're talking a Magical Christmas Land 6 out of 7. The odds are at least as good of an insta-kill out of Storm combo turn 1.

There's no question that Fastbond would be a somewhat broken card if it was legal but that's true of a bunch of cards that are legal at this point and most of them interact better with Brainstorm than Fastbond would. Why not put some competing speed in the format to make it less Brainstorm-centric? This is why the Survival ban was so bad. Yes, it did work in Bant builds alongside Brainstorm however it also enabled a bunch of non-blue lists to be competitive. The argument from WotC as the time was that it created such consistency that we'd likely see top 8's that were 50% Survival oriented for the forseeable future. How is that different than the cantrip-cantrip-kill you that is prevalent now?

[FoolofaTook]

I think they should ban Thespian's Stage or Dark Depths.

RG Lands is simply too powerful a deck right now with this combo available to them. If they had to play the deck the way it used to be played pre-combo (i.e. strong but slower control deck that grinds them out with Barbarian Ring, or Mindslaver, or man-lands) it would still be strong but not nearly the best or second best deck in the format it is right now.

I'm completely serious when I say this. Lands crushes everything that isn't fast combo, and then boards into a sideboard full of hate for that combo *and* can combo out with its Marit Lage token fast enough to beat combo in one turn. The only thing that is stopping Lands from dominating every tournament is simply the lack of people playing the deck for various reasons (bias toward blue, lack of Tabernacles, etc).

Lands is doing what it is doing because it is an outlier list in which the player playing it has a lot of experience against various archetypes and the player being crushed has almost no experience against Lands.

Surgical Extraction, Tsabo's Web, Leylines of the Void, Suppression Field, Blood Moon and many other lesser options all offer significant protection against Lands. If Lands became a big thing people would metagame against it and learn the matchup and it would become a much slower combo-control list that frequently died to opposing hate.

[Lemnear]

The argument from WotC as the time was that it created such consistency that we'd likely see top 8's that were 50% Survival oriented for the forseeable future.

Stop spreading bullshit. WotC never made a prediction. Here is the official statement:

In recent months, Survival of the Fittest decks have been outperforming other decks in Legacy. This has caused the competitive format to become significantly less diverse. This has reached a point where the DCI concluded that it is appropriate to ban a card.

Other cards were considered, such as Vengevine. However some of the winning decks do not even play Vengevine; instead, they primarily rely on combinations with Necrotic Ooze. Also, Survival is a card that gives the decks a lot of resilience to potential answer cards. Some combination decks fail when they draw cards intended as answers to opponents' decks instead of cards that are part of their winning combination. However, with Survival of the Fittest on the battlefield, a drawn Qasali Pridemage can be replaced with any other creature in the deck for one mana.

Edit: Source

The verdict of the three bolded parts is:

1) Survival decreased strategic diversity
2) Survival is resistant to answers
3) It's a repeatable Tutor for 1 mana

[Wilkin]

Stop spreading bullshit. WotC never made a prediction. Here is the official statement:



The verdict of the three bolded parts is:

1) Survival decreased strategic diversity
2) Survival is resistant to answers
3) It's a repeatable Tutor for 1 mana

Thank you. Sure, Survival dominated and was miserable to play against. It's a tutor card that is resilient vs hate. It could either tutor up an effect to deal with your Hate and even if it couldn't it could just hardcast Vengevines to beat you (especially if you mulled too hard for your Needle etc.).

Sure, there are more cards printed since the banning that are hateful towards Survival....Deathrite, Decay, RIP etc. I'm not sure that's enough.

I think Brainstorm is a crazy powerful card (and I can understand the arguments to ban it) but IMHO it wouldn't even be the top 2 cards I'd ban if I was given the option to. I'd probably be Show and Tell and Sensei's Divining Top. Show and Tell is gettting pretty insane, and WOTC aren't going to stop printing stupid cards so.... And Top, I hate matches going to time. Top is a big culprit as to why. Well, I guess Miracles specifically but annoying as it is, I don't think you can ban Counterbalance. Or Terminus.

And ban Dark Depths or Stage? Really? Why? Just because the deck did well at Worcester? It's a good deck. Can be extremely annoying. But it's not an autowin vs fair decks. I've done well vs deck. Including one at Worcester. He made a Marit Lage token. I dealt with it and dealt with the 2nd one 2 turns later.

[Chatto]

I think they should ban Thespian's Stage or Dark Depths.

RG Lands is simply too powerful a deck right now with this combo available to them. If they had to play the deck the way it used to be played pre-combo (i.e. strong but slower control deck that grinds them out with Barbarian Ring, or Mindslaver, or man-lands) it would still be strong but not nearly the best or second best deck in the format it is right now.

I'm completely serious when I say this. Lands crushes everything that isn't fast combo, and then boards into a sideboard full of hate for that combo *and* can combo out with its Marit Lage token fast enough to beat combo in one turn. The only thing that is stopping Lands from dominating every tournament is simply the lack of people playing the deck for various reasons (bias toward blue, lack of Tabernacles, etc).

The only reason RG Lands does well is because (and it has been stated already) no-one knows how to play against this deck. The reason for this (which also been stated) there are few players willing to invest in specific cards (Tabernacle being the biggest hurdle), and thus piloting this deck. It would very much surprise me if WotC would ban either Stage or DD. Hell, the deck isn't even dominating any meta!

(Of course I'm being biased, but come on! There are other cards being far more dominating)

[MGB]

The only reason RG Lands does well is because (and it has been stated already) no-one knows how to play against this deck. The reason for this (which also been stated) there are few players willing to invest in specific cards (Tabernacle being the biggest hurdle), and thus piloting this deck. It would very much surprise me if WotC would ban either Stage or DD. Hell, the deck isn't even dominating any meta!

(Of course I'm being biased, but come on! There are other cards being far more dominating)

This isn't really true.

As data has shown, RG Lands has the highest win percentage of all decks in Legacy. Which means that of the people that *are* playing it, they do better with it *as a whole* than any other group. It's not just David Long doing well with Lands.

The reason Lands isn't dominating Top8s completely is simply because not enough people play it. If everyone had access to the cards in the deck *and* alot of the top players wanted to play it over a blue-based shell, I think Lands would basically be 60% or more of any given Legacy Top 16.

As a whole, the Lands archetype, now that it has access to a one-turn-kill combo, is simply too powerful. It has the tools to crush every fair deck, it has a sideboard full of hate for combo, and it has its own fast, resilient one-turn-kill combo.

I'm perfectly OK with Lands as an archetype and a deck in this format, but I think that one of the two-three most powerful control decks in the format should not have access to a tutorable, recurrable, one-turn-kill combo as its win condition. Lands would still be a solid deck without Dark Depths and/or Thespian's Stage, it just wouldn't completely crush every fair deck it goes against.

[nedleeds]

Stop spreading bullshit. WotC never made a prediction. Here is the official statement:



The verdict of the three bolded parts is:

1) Survival decreased strategic diversity
2) Survival is resistant to answers
3) It's a repeatable Tutor for 1 mana

Thank you. Sure, Survival dominated and was miserable to play against. It's a tutor card that is resilient vs hate. It could either tutor up an effect to deal with your Hate and even if it couldn't it could just hardcast Vengevines to beat you (especially if you mulled too hard for your Needle etc.).

Sure, there are more cards printed since the banning that are hateful towards Survival....Deathrite, Decay, RIP etc. I'm not sure that's enough.

OK let's go to the WotC well then with respect to Derpstorm.

Legacy

Mental Misstep is banned.

Force of Will has long been thought of as a card that helps keep combination decks in check in Legacy and Vintage. However, it doesn't directly help decks that aren't playing blue. One idea that was floated was creating a similar card that could be played in nonblue decks. When Phyrexian mana was designed, it was an opportunity to create such a card. R&D wanted a card that could help fight combination decks, and could also fight blue decks by countering cards such as Brainstorm. Clearly printing a card like this has a lot of risk, but there is also the potential for helping the format a lot. The risk is mitigated, because if it turns out poorly, the DCI can ban the card.

Unfortunately, it turned out poorly. Looking at high-level tournaments, instead of results having blue and nonblue decks playing Mental Misstep, there are more blue decks than ever. The DCI is banning Mental Misstep, with the hopes of restoring the more diverse metagame that existed prior to the printing of Mental Misstep.

He specifically calls out "blue decks". Eric Lauer.

Some people here claim a diverse field is 16 blue decks all playing 4 Brainstorm and most playing 4 Ponder / 4 FoW. Their perverse rationale is because the best aggro deck is blue, the best 2 card combo deck is blue, the best control deck is blue, the best momentum combo deck is blue that still makes for a wide open field full of innovation. Completely oblivious to the fact that you had a 48 card format (minus some Islands and fetches I guess ... #banisland).

He clearly correlates the preponderance of "blue decks" with a lack of diversity. Meaning having to play blue to compete is bad in their view, thus the card in question got banned. Every single argument he makes here applies to Brainstorm. He even calls the piece of shit out in his explanation.

Why they don't apply the same rationale to derpstorm is ridiculous. I wouldn't be surprised in the least to see a worse card like DTT or Ponder be the next sacrificial lamb at the altar of the holy one and it's a shame because Dig is an interesting card, it can be attacked from a number of angles, is bad in multiples in openers (without derpstorm to of course shuffle it back), and doesn't deserve to be banned.

[menace13]

OK let's go to the WotC well then with respect to Derpstorm.



He specifically calls out "blue decks". Eric Lauer.

blue decks

"But, color diversity is casual. Hurrrr."

[Gheizen64]

To be completely honest, i liked MM a lot. Sure it made the format absurdly slower and was a 4-of in almost anything (but who care, this isn't a criteria for banning a card for BS it shouldn't be for MM either), but it also made decks like MUD significantly better, and midrange in general. It also could be played in non-blue, while still being a blue card. Well whatever, it ain't coming back. The best part about MM was imho the possibility of unbanning some more cards because of how hostile the format would be against combo with it unbanned (was thinking about M. Vault)

[Barook]

It also could be played in non-blue, while still being a blue card.

The problem was, however, that it was better in blue decks than in nonblue decks, for various reasons (pitchable to FoW, castable without life investment, being able Brainstorm it away if dead).

This kind of hate card can't possibly work in the grand scheme of things. Symmetrical drawbacks are the only way blue decks keep their greedy clutches from cards that are supposed to fight blue.

[maharis]

He clearly correlates the preponderance of "blue decks" with a lack of diversity. Meaning having to play blue to compete is bad in their view, thus the card in question got banned. Every single argument he makes here applies to Brainstorm. He even calls the piece of shit out in his explanation.

MM was banned before Modern really took off (and they realized they could make money off it with Modern Masters). I think it would still be banned today, but they would carefully avoid criticizing color diversity because it is clear they see Legacy as a lost cause due to the reserved list or whatever. In the ban explanation for Treasure Cruise, blue-red Delver decks are specifically cited as the boogeyman, despite the fact that the deck underperformed at GPNJ and the best Treasure Cruise decks were clearly moving into the Stoneforge realm.

The upshot: Wizards used to care about color diversity because it needs a non-rotating format to keep its standard card values high. (If players get bit by the rotation dive too often, they won't stick around and buy more packs). Once Extended died and Modern came around, Legacy was even less necessary than before.

Why they don't apply the same rationale to derpstorm is ridiculous. I wouldn't be surprised in the least to see a worse card like DTT or Ponder be the next sacrificial lamb at the altar of the holy one and it's a shame because Dig is an interesting card, it can be attacked from a number of angles, is bad in multiples in openers (without derpstorm to of course shuffle it back), and doesn't deserve to be banned.

Dig's crime will be stated that it took two decks into the stratosphere (Miracles and Omnitell). Of course, the brainstorm-fetch engine is the only reason either of those decks play Dig Through Time.

Banning Ponder would be a colossal mistake as it would be pretty much admitting that they know the format is fucked but they don't have the stones to take Brainstorm down.

For what it's worth, I would be happy at this point if they at least started with Show and Tell and gave us back something that makes a new deck, like Earthcraft or Survival. There is a chance that a better engine that doesn't need Brainstorm to survive (though of course earthcraft and survival decks both could play brainstorm) could at least dent blue's metagame dominance.

[FoolofaTook]

The fact that the argument over Brainstorm is raging at this point in a format in which 70%+ of the best lists incorporate it has to be embarrassing to WotC on some level. My best guess is that Marketing, R&D and the people above them just don't have a clue what to do about the situation.

They don't want to do something that causes competitive attendance to decline however they also don't know how much the current competitive base is effected by the blue shells dominance. For every player who loves casting Brainstorm there's probably a player out there who hates playing endless blue shell mirrors and/or has a pet archetype that just isn't doable against a blue shell heavy meta.

Then you add in the likelihood that the longer the shell is allowed to dominate the more players become accustomed to it as the dominant presence in the meta. It's almost a situation where waiting has no downside for WotC unless attendance declines force their hand. It's not hard to shape a Legacy meta where the people who don't like the blue shell just go away, hopefully feeding into Modern in the process.

Flash-Hulk was a big winner in terms of spike publicity and then Flash got banned. Jace was a gold standard print that got everybody buzzing before it became buzzkill and got banned in Standard and Modern. Treasure Cruise drove a huge GP, although not quite up to the hype beforehand, and got banned. The point of all this is that blue and powerful has been both a blessing and a curse for WotC in the past. I'm guessing the people who make this decision just don't have a clue what to do about Legacy's sudden evolution into a very blue format.

[Ingo]

This isn't really true.
As data has shown, RG Lands has the highest win percentage of all decks in Legacy. Which means that of the people that *are* playing it, they do better with it *as a whole* than any other group. It's not just David Long doing well with Lands.

Actually, it is. You are referring to data which consists only out of just 130 matches. That's not much, considering that top 8-ing an event probably consists of about 15 matches played (Swiss + top8, just an estimate). As Long top8-ed 3 times in timespan DC-Portland, what huge percentage of the 130 matches should be attributed to him?
Also illustrating the relativity of the data, Food Chain Combo and MUD take place 2 and 3. Are these decks overpowered too then? I found the first DTB, Miracles, on spot number 13, the second, RUG Delver, on spot 17.

Point being, the data is just a snapshot of a limited timespan, and too limited to draw conclusions.
Same for the results of the last SCG event. A total of 6 landsplayers is way too narrow to draw conclusions, even if 4 of them make day 2.

[Barook]

I'm guessing the people who make this decision just don't have a clue what to do about Legacy's sudden evolution into a very blue format.

Except the evolution wasn't really sudden. The only major jump was after Delver (if we exclude the Misstep era), after that, it has been a gradual increase each year with each blue-related bullshit card they print.

Since they basically admitted that they don't stop printing blue bullshit as long as it's fine in Standard, the least thing they can do without banning a ton of blue cards is:

1) Stop printing dumb blue cards in Eternal products. Flusterstorm? Awesome. TNN? Fuck that.

2) Start printing more blue-related hate in Eternal products that is symmetrical. E.g. a Sulfur Elemental for blue creatures would go a long way to fight off blue since it kills everything relevant aside from flipped Delvers. Or maindeckable, symmetrical hate permanents that aren't sorcery speed and cost at least twice as much as the card they're supposed to answer, Brainstorm.

3) Print better consistency tools for nonblue decks that don't go well with blue deck. That is probably the hardest part.