All B/R update speculation.

[Dice_Box]

Personally I hate TNN more than DRS. While DRS causes issued with homogeneity in deck building I feel it adds net benefits to Legacy. I think it's effect of suppressing graveyards is often overlooked. It's a bitch sure but it does not have the same 'I did everything right and then my opponent just played a card I can't interact with and I lost regardless of my tight play' that TNN does. TNN invalidates so much for so little.

Seriously, what good does TNN add to the format? If you playing a 3 drop creature in Legacy your really having to twist yourself into a pretzel to justify playing anything else.

[taconaut]

Demonic Cantrip
Sorcery, B
Draw two cards, lose two life.
~this~ can't be cast unless you control a basic Swamp.

This card is broken. I would 100% play this in storm, alongside my four brainstorms, and if you banned brainstorm, it would still be bananas.

It just hit SDT because it was the core card of the deck AND caused time issues because one slow chucklefuck is enough to hold up the entire tournament. Even if it sucks that other decks were hit hard by the colleteral damage.

This is still true, and didn't change because top is gone. That issue has more to do with the way tournaments are set up more than it does with any individual card, and the time justification for banning top is vacuous. Rounds still go to time, and it only takes one person to make it happen.

The format in general would be better without Brainstorm, Probe and Ponder. Both Vintage and Modern eventually came to the conclusion that Ponder and Probe are too good and that Preordain is still good enough as a cantrip. Brainstorm is restricted in Vintage and was never printed in Modern.

This. Probe is banned in Modern/Restricted in vintage. Ponder is banned in modern/restricted in vintage. Brainstorm is restricted in Vintage. Neither of those formats are mired by ridiculous number of just 8+ cantrip decks (for multiple other reasons), but you know what format is? The one where all of these busted fucking pieces of shit are legal.

....so play vintage or modern? Or even standard, where the gold standard cantrip is Opt, and that's the best it's been in years?

The format would not be better without the cantrips, it would just be higher variance. What is wrong about being able to execute your plan each game, or find answers for your opponent's game? Mana screw or flood makes for the actual worst games of Magic, and getting rid of the cantrips makes those games happen more often. Cantrips allow people to actually interact and play, which is better than the alternative.

Plus, you can still play non-cantrip decks in Legacy! 3/7 of the current DtB are non-cantrip, and there are plenty of decks not currently on that page that are still great! I'm not saying that cantrip decks aren't still great, and perhaps the best thing you can be doing, but if we have to have a best deck, we could do worse than the interactive, skill-testing, fair Grixis Delver.

I honestly have moved heavily away from the format. It's just a bad format right now.

But it isn't bad - it's interactive, there is a diversity of archetypes represented (with the possible exception of Aggro, depending on how you characterize burn), and even though Grixis is probably a bit too strong, there isn't one deck that is unbeatable. What else could you want from a format? I get that you guys just really hate blue in your bones, but it's hard to address that argument because you can't change the colors of the cards. If the textural differences between the archetypes isn't enough, I'm not sure if it's a tractable problem.

I like cantrips as much as anyone else but at some point multiple formats and years of history have to be allowed to say something. That something is that cantrips are a fundamentally broken concept.

I can't really speak to Pauper because I don't play it, but I feel like even if you accept the premise that cantrips are inherently broken (which I dispute), I still think they make the game better: do you want to win because you "had it" and your opponent didn't, or do you want to win because you both had what you needed and you played it better? Cantrips make for less of the former and more of the latter.

[Stuart]

Just play a different format and be happy.

A lot of the “Brainstorm Forever!” camp would benefit from this as well. Play some Modern and Vintage, and you’ll get a perspective on why 4 Brainstorm is absurd and shouldn’t be taken for granted.

[Mr. Safety]

Why is the restricting method so taboo in non-Vintage formats? It solves a lot of problems without actually removing cards from play (seemingly.)

[Lemnear]

Why is the restricting method so taboo in non-Vintage formats? It solves a lot of problems without actually removing cards from play (seemingly.)

You question THE fundamental difference between these formats, with Vintage defined by restrictions of cards too powerful, while Legacy bans them. It's like questioning why Modern isn't including Onslaught or Saga blocks.

I don't see the appeal of turning Legacy into "Vintage without Power" in general. It's not that Vintage went through the roof in the last 10 years thanks to these excessive restrictions.

I would rather see clear bans in Legacy than Vintage-levels of generic blue "deckbuilding" a la

4x FoW
1x Probe
1x Brainstorm
1x Ponder
4x Preordain

[taconaut]

A lot of the “Brainstorm Forever!” camp would benefit from this as well. Play some Modern and Vintage, and you’ll get a perspective on why 4 Brainstorm is absurd and shouldn’t be taken for granted.

I definitely don't take it for granted - the reason I play Legacy and not Modern is because WOTC built Modern on all the principles the anti-cantrip crowd wants for Legacy, and consequently Modern is awful.

I would 100% play vintage if I could afford it, though. I would do it even though Shops would eat my lunch every other round

[Lord Seth]

Why is the restricting method so taboo in non-Vintage formats? It solves a lot of problems without actually removing cards from play (seemingly.)

Because the point of Vintage is that overpowered cards are only restricted rather than banned.

Also, Vintage has the benefit that there's so many broken cards restricted that you'll draw a decent number of them, whereas in other formats it just increases the variance of who happens to draw their 1-of restricted card gaining a big advantage.

You question THE fundamental difference between these formats, with Vintage defined by restrictions of cards too powerful, while Legacy bans them. It's like questioning why Modern isn't including Onslaught or Saga blocks.

Saga maybe, but not Onslaught. Modern was made as a way to have a nonrotating format that avoids the Reserved List, but starting it with Onslaught would still fit that description (Saga has reserved cards and cannot be used in it). Considering they straight-up admitted that the starting point of Modern was totally arbitrary, I don't think there's really anything in the identity of the format that would be changed if they moved the starting point back to Onslaught or even as far back as Mercadian Masques. Not to say the format's metagame wouldn't changed a bunch due to new cards being added, but that happens each year with new Standard sets anyway.

[Dice_Box]

I definitely don't take it for granted - the reason I play Legacy and not Modern is because WOTC built Modern on all the principles the anti-cantrip crowd wants for Legacy, and consequently Modern is awful.

I would 100% play vintage if I could afford it, though. I would do it even though Shops would eat my lunch every other round

The thing is, Legacy has A LOT of cantrips. I do not like Brainstorm myself and feel the format would be much better without it, that doesn't mean I want to line up everything else and knock them down to seek out a copy of Modern. I feel like comparing the views of those who do not approve of one card to a whole format you don't like is reductive. Your not going to get a conversation if your opening gambit is basicly another form of "Go play Modern". I do, Lantern rocks.

Ponder is a broken as fuck card but it's not Banable. Preordain is actually fairly mundane. Opt, Visions (More a modern thing but it did once see legacy play a long time ago), Portent and Predict, Legacy has so many legal cantrips that to take them all out you would have to make the ban list laughable.

The "Anti cantrip crowd" is often only talking about one card, it's not like anyone's coming for your Preordains and your Volcanic Islands.

[Claymore]

The fact that Portent came out of nowhere to be a Miracles staple (assuming, haven't checked the GP lists) means there's no way that Cantrip decks are going anywhere even if half the played cantrips were emergency banned tomorrow.

[maharis]

Personally I hate TNN more than DRS. While DRS causes issued with homogeneity in deck building I feel it adds net benefits to Legacy. I think it's effect of suppressing graveyards is often overlooked. It's a bitch sure but it does not have the same 'I did everything right and then my opponent just played a card I can't interact with and I lost regardless of my tight play' that TNN does. TNN invalidates so much for so little.

Seriously, what good does TNN add to the format? If you playing a 3 drop creature in Legacy your really having to twist yourself into a pretzel to justify playing anything else.

We spend a considerable amount of time on this on Eternal Durdles this week. 57:00-1:04:00 I think. Fuck TNN.

[morgan_coke]

Man, Modern would be SO MUCH BETTER if it included IPA, OTJ, and OLN. Like it's not even close how much better and cooler the format would be.

Plus, Astral Slide suckas!!!!

[maharis]

This. Probe is banned in Modern/Restricted in vintage. Ponder is banned in modern/restricted in vintage. Brainstorm is restricted in Vintage. Neither of those formats are mired by ridiculous number of just 8+ cantrip decks (for multiple other reasons), but you know what format is? The one where all of these busted fucking pieces of shit are legal.

I actually think it would be an interesting experiment to take a Vintage deck that plays:

4 Preordain
1 Ancestral
1 Gush
1 DTT
1 Cruise
1 Brainstorm
1 Ponder
1 Probe
1 Mystical Tutor

and just replace those 12 with:

4 Brainstorm
4 Probe
4 Ponder

and see which deck is actually better.

The argument to ban DRS in Modern way back when was that Modern Jund was essentially a Legacy deck. I wonder if some of these Legacy decks, if ported fully to Vintage (that is, being allowed to play 4 of BS and Ponder and Probe but not any other restricted cards), would be powerful enough to compete, even with decks that have RL access.

[Cave]

You mostly can't, because cantripping at 1 mana is not an investment and Xerox is just the best way to build decks, period. Hell, even Pauper is slowly but surely Xeroxifying...+other stuff

What.
1. Blue Delver decks (now in the reincarnated UR shell) have been tier 1 in pauper forever. The format is not "xeroxifying" or whatever it's called.

2. I came from vintage, like many of us, a long ago. And I don't understand this whole cantrip hate. Are you all forgetting that vintage is a format where true card advantage engines are playable, like gush, ancestral, gifts ungiven, tfk, and many more 1x random nukebombs? Note that here I'm not talking about card selection, that's for pussies. I mean actually casting a card and ending up having more cards in hand than before casting it. And yet, despite this, mud monobrown was uncontested tier 1 for soooooooooo long time. What's the reason? Just simply mud had better cards before the bans, cards that played on a different angle of attack and couldn't be splashed in the usual "xerox" (no offense, but that's a stupid name for real) core.

Of course, blue is the best support shell. It gives what you want and protects it. What's the news? If in the next set we're gonna have a very viable [insert color] creature for 1+[insert color], then

8 Fetch
6 Duals
4 Wasteland
4 Delver
4 Deathrite
4 New Creature
2 Angler/Tnn
4 Daze
4 Fow
4 Ponder
4 Brainstorm
4 [Insert Color] Removal
2 Meta

is gonna be tier 1. If the creature is reeeeeally good and costs 3, we're gonna have Stoneblade back to top tier, just switch shell.

I stated my opinion already. We need good cards that can't be splashed in a blue shell. TKS was a good try.
Look at what Miracles used to do against tempo decks (haven't played it in years): G2 side out all counters side in 5-6 must answer threats, and then you go Blood Moon into Terminus into Jace into Keranos and if one sticks you win. We need unsplashable cards.

[Lemnear]

The fact that Portent came out of nowhere to be a Miracles staple (assuming, haven't checked the GP lists) means there's no way that Cantrip decks are going anywhere even if half the played cantrips were emergency banned tomorrow.

This is the very core of why i consider banning Brainstorm low impact on the bigger picture. You fuck over a bunch of combo and tempo decks here and there by stripping them from the ability to shuffle situational cards back, but the rest does give a fuck and simply plays...

4x FoW
4x DRS
4x Delver
4x Probe
4x Ponder
4x Preordain
8x Fetch

I can't see how that is a fundamental fix for the ongoing dominance of 3c/4c goodstuff decks and blue being the superior core for card selection. Not even ANT would give THAT much of a fuck.

[Crimhead]

.
Plus, you can still play non-cantrip decks in Legacy! 3/7 of the current DtB are non-cantrip...

But they're not Maverick or Jund.

The fact that the best non-cantrip decks are Lands, Eldrazi, D&T, and Elves - rather than regular fair decks - just goes to show how terrible this format really is.

[Mr. Safety]

Question for everyone at large: would you still play Brainstorm as a 4-of if it was a sorcery?

[taconaut]

The thing is, Legacy has A LOT of cantrips. I do not like Brainstorm myself and feel the format would be much better without it, that doesn't mean I want to line up everything else and knock them down to seek out a copy of Modern. I feel like comparing the views of those who do not approve of one card to a whole format you don't like is reductive. Your not going to get a conversation if your opening gambit is basicly another form of "Go play Modern". I do, Lantern rocks.

The "Anti cantrip crowd" is often only talking about one card, it's not like anyone's coming for your Preordains and your Volcanic Islands.

I think you, personally, may be talking specifically about Brainstorm, but many of the posters here have made it very clear that they hate cantrips of all kinds. I also disagree on banning specifically brainstorm, as I think getting rid of it will make for more non-games, but your perspective is still more nuanced than many of the anti-cantrip posts we've seen.

I'm not trying to tell people to "go play modern" by way of excluding them; I'm trying to ask those people, "why not play modern?"

The things those players want, in general, roughly align with decisions they have made in modern: cantrips are banned, deathrite shaman is banned, TNN isn't legal, many different kinds of janky, creature-based decks are playable, you can get away with not playing blue, et cetera et cetera. I don't want to kick them out of Legacy; I want to understand why they want to make Legacy something it's not, instead of just seeking out the play patterns you want in other formats that actively encourage them. Every time I consider playing Modern, I realize Probe/Ponder/Preordain/various other things are banned, and instead of complaining about it, I just play a format where they are legal, instead. Why do we need Legacy to be another "duders and removal" format, when there are already at least three I can think of that fit that description?

But they're not Maverick or Jund.

The fact that the best non-cantrip decks are Lands, Eldrazi, D&T, and Elves - rather than regular fair decks - just goes to show how terrible this format really is.

Why do Maverick and Jund need to be playable for the format to be good?

Moreover, Czech Pile is just Jund with blue instead of red - you have a stack of just "good cards" and try to grind your opponents down. They trade resources and try to make a fair game of Magic. Personally, I think Lands, D&T, and Elves are all vastly more interesting from a strategic/tactical perspective, but if you want to play fair in Legacy, it's not the nature of the format that is holding you back.

That being said, I don't even think Maverick is that bad - I've certainly lost to it, I'm sure others have, too. Shouldn't it even be a bit better in a Grixis Delver-rich meta? (I can't speak to that not having personally played Maverick).

Man, Modern would be SO MUCH BETTER if it included IPA, OTJ, and OLN. Like it's not even close how much better and cooler the format would be.

Plus, Astral Slide suckas!!!!

I agree, though in my heart of hearts I am afraid that Slide wouldn't be good enough to be competitive

[Lemnear]

Question for everyone at large: would you still play Brainstorm as a 4-of if it was a sorcery?

A 100%.

If we are honest, most of the key brainstorms played in Legacy are cast during one of your own mainphases anyways.

[Crimhead]

Moreover, Czech Pile is just Jund with blue instead of red - you have a stack of just "good cards" and try to grind your opponents down. They trade resources and try to make a fair game of Magic.

That's a very interesting take. I always felt Czech was more like Sneaky Show, ANT, Miracles, and U/R Delver. Pretty much the other exact same deck with different win conditions.

[ubernostrum]

While DRS causes issued with homogeneity in deck building I feel it adds net benefits to Legacy. I think it's effect of suppressing graveyards is often overlooked.

I think its effect of suppressing graveyards is often overstated.

I've brought this up before, but: if Deathrite Shaman is such a great anti-graveyard card, why does Elves still roll over and die to Reanimator? It's running a playset of Deathrites, after all.

And the answer is: because the real thing that suppresses graveyard decks is not Deathrite Shaman, it's Deathrite Shaman backed up by free counterspells. Taking Deathrite Shaman out of the format would slightly weaken the free-counterspell decks against graveyard strategies, but they still get to, y'know, counter key spells for zero mana. And the non-blue decks already have to have real hate in their sideboards, which would not change with Deathrite gone.

Meanwhile, I'll spin up the broken record again and remind everyone that Deathrite Shaman's sin is giving greedy mana bases immunity to the things that traditionally policed greedy mana bases (Wasteland and Blood Moon and, to a lesser extent, Stifle). Which in turn homogenizes the format on whatever the best greedy-mana-base goodstuff pile is. Which is what we've been seeing for months now.

It really and truly is time for the little Elf to go away.