The current state of Magic

[Bithlord]

The people who strongly dislike the cantrip shell are a very vocal minority in my experience.

I'm not part of the vocal minority (but, part of the minority, I guess? just not super vocal about it). I'm fine with blue having that power level, I just wish they would make other colors match that level somehow.

The inability of other colors to deal with combo, and the inability of other colors to draw efficiently, seems to enforce the "play blue, or you are doing something wrong" impression of Legacy. I say impression because it's not always accurate, but it is certainly what people see when they look at it from the outside.

[Lemnear]

The inability of other colors to deal with combo, and the inability of other colors to draw efficiently, seems to enforce the "play blue, or you are doing something wrong" impression of Legacy. I say impression because it's not always accurate, but it is certainly what people see when they look at it from the outside.

I think that people with such an idea are ignorant at best, because it's an indirect claim that Resistors, discard and hatebears are unable to adress combo decks. We know that it's far from the truth.

[tescrin]

I think that people with such an idea are ignorant at best, because it's an indirect claim that Resistors, discard and hatebears are unable to adress combo decks. We know that it's far from the truth.

With the necessary caveats:
* Such decks that are missing counterspells are far worse at doing it (Read as: many years of experience playing GBx variants with hatebears
* Such decks would be cremated from the format if an inadequate number of Forces were being run in total

The difference having Force in a deck when going against Elves is gargantuan. The difference of a combo deck respecting your hand on their turn and just jizzing all over the battlefield entirely comes down to counterspells. You can have all the flyers, Jitte, discard, and removal you want, but having a few counterspells will always make it much easier; in part because they tend to jam their combo a turn later.

If they were willing to make Unmask as an Instant; we could see the non-blue midrange decks *maybe* step up a notch; but wizards won't even print instant speed Duress, let alone a free one. It's amazing how 25 years later, one Garfield's only mistakes on the color pie (not understanding card advantage/selection yet and that counterspells are crucial not to lock into a color) and we're still stuck with that decision.

It's not even BS that is the thing, it's that BS *and* Force not only have good synergy, but that they're both fairly necessary (if you want a reliable game against combo.)

I will not hear BS like
"yeah just cast your T2 hatebear against my Storm deck you newb LOL
A deck that could kill you T0 reliably if it weren't for blue decks in the format. Nerf blue!! Newbs with your blue!
Just use Discard on my deck that can play everything from the graveyard! You don't even need blue!"

My
ass.

I played non-blue midrange for like 5 years. I know those combo matchups and while I could win against a subset of them, things like Storm, Dredge, sometimes S&T, and Elves can be giant pains because you literally can't cast your answers before you're dead. What's more? They run protections themselves so if you have to wait until T2 and have no way to guard your hand then you're even more vulnerable.

I know the pain of having to cast a discard, figure out their several lines that screw me with my one card, and hope that they don't topdeck a solution; only to lose before I get a T2 because they have nothing to fear from non-blue.

[Dice_Box]

Filtering is a hell of a drug, it's the difference between a mess of shitty cards and a winning strategy. Case in point, Painter without Top.

[thecrav]

Filtering is a hell of a drug, it's the difference between a mess of shitty cards and a winning strategy. Case in point, Painter without Top.

Workshop decks do okay without filtering >_>

[Namida]

Workshop decks do okay without filtering >_>

From the outside looking in, I think that's because Workshop decks spend a lot of time facing off against decks that have decided to just fill their slots with so much air like Flusterstorm, Red Blasts and Mental Misstep that do nothing against a ton of 2+ mana artifacts that even with the card selection it's hard to just not draw dead cards. Workshop decks also are filled to the brim with ways to start the game with 2+ mana which are not allowed in "normal Magic," so they're able to be more consistent with their starts compared to other formats where you don't get to consistently jump ahead turns into the game to punish people using their first turns spinning their wheels with card filtering as much as you can in Vintage. Workshop is doing as well as it is because it is doing something that is universally agreed to be "too good," against decks that often spend many of their resources begging to lose to that type of strategy.

[rufus]

...It's amazing how 25 years later, one Garfield's only mistakes on the color pie (not understanding card advantage/selection yet and that counterspells are crucial not to lock into a color) and we're still stuck with that decision. ...

Not only that, but WotC is doubling down on it by putting flash creatures into blue as well.

As long as WotC is trying to turn Magic into Hearthstone, we probably won't see too much of it, but there's certainly potential for instant speed interaction that is not not blue and not hard counters.

[morgan_coke]

Not only that, but WotC is doubling down on it by putting flash creatures into blue as well.

As long as WotC is trying to turn Magic into Hearthstone, we probably won't see too much of it, but there's certainly potential for instant speed interaction that is not not blue and not hard counters.

What's more amazing to me than anything else is that blue creatures have power creeped so much that Vendilion Clique is pretty much outclassed at this point.

[Bithlord]

What's more amazing to me than anything else is that blue creatures have power creeped so much that Vendilion Clique is pretty much outclassed at this point.

The rate of blue creature creep relative to other colors has been pretty insane starting around Inistrad (e.g. Delver). It's really odd watching WotC bend over backwards trying to defend how blue just doesn't have *enough* so they need to give it more.

On the filtering note, while I agree that garfield originally missed the mark on counterspells and card advantage being "only blue", it's on WotC now that they have locked in and doubled down on it. They *still* don't understand how good filtering is.

[Dice_Box]

That's not true at all, they understand very much how good it is, that's why you almost never see it in Standard for a reasonable cost. The times they get it wrong they know about it because while we might bitch, the Standard community can both bitch and be heard.

[Bithlord]

That's not true at all, they understand very much how good it is, that's why you almost never see it in Standard for a reasonable cost. The times they get it wrong they know about it because while we might bitch, the Standard community can both bitch and be heard.

I guess that's fair. Instead of elevating other colors to blues power level, they are reducing blues power level (in standard obviously) to the other colors. The problem for us is that this doesn't help us one whit with color power balance.

Every color should get counterspells, and maybe only blue gets unconditional ones? Without breaking the color pie:

Green hard counters creature spells, and has sacrifice this creature counter X-spell type abilities.
Red hard counters artifacts and sorceries.
White Tax counters everything (e.g. mana leak).
Blue hard counters everything, but at a bit higher cost and hard counters sorcery / instants.
Black hard counters planeswalkers and pays life to hard counter everything (e.g. BB, pay 2 life, counter target spell).

Obviously this is just off the cuff, but it seems like counter spelling things, but maybe not everything, could *easily* fit in each color pies justification.

Also, cantriping on spells should be an every color thing, but pure cantrips (e.g. ponder) can stay locked into blue.

[Dice_Box]

I guess that's fair. Instead of elevating other colors to blues power level, they are reducing blues power level (in standard obviously) to the other colors. The problem for us is that this doesn't help us one whit with color power balance.

That's the price of playing in a format that doesn't rotate. Look, I'm vocal about Brainstorm, but my issue is with that card and I comment about the Blue stew, but really my issue is that card. If your going to play Legacy you accept that the past holds mistakes that are not going to be repaired. Is Blue objectively the best colour in the format? Yes. Do you have an issue with that? Well that's on you.

We can dream about what would fix this, but every time Wizards tries to fix a problem in this game they fuck something else up worse. Mental Misstep, Decay, DRS, Cavern of Souls even. I'm not unhappy Cavern exists, but it's a fucking sledgehammer taken to an issue because they didn't want to ban something. DRS being an answer to Lingering Souls still amuses me.

MM was meant to answer Brainstorm... That's its stated reason for existing. You give me choice between Brainstorm being legal or MM, I'll take the status quo. Some things you just have to accept, Blue is best, I accept that, Blue could use a thing here or there taken out of it, I accept that too, we should try and raise everything up and warp this format even more than the last 9 years has? I think that's a harder question, because even with the best intentions Wizards almost always fucks it up.

[kinda]

I don't understand the mental misstep hate and yes I played it in legacy.

[Lemnear]

Such decks that are missing counterspells are far worse at doing it (Read as: many years of experience playing GBx variants with hatebears

That's a slightly different topic. The claim, i disagree with, is that people are pushed into blue, because it provides the only answers to combo, which isn't true. It "only" has the best zero-mana-options for doing so. By itself that's not an issue and neither makes it mandatory to play the color to battle combo by itself. If the same color however also provides the best cardadvantage, filtering, colorfixing, manaacceleration as well as the finest threats and combo enablers of the format, we might notice the critical mass of arguments in favor of running blue. The rabbithole for blue as your decks backbone is far deeper than just FoW. We both know that.

[Bithlord]

I don't understand the mental misstep hate and yes I played it in legacy.

If I recall correctly, Mental Mistep hate had to do with literally every deck (instead of just most decks) having to start with 4X mental misstep. Because, not only was it the best answer to some huge power cards (brainstorm, top, etc) it was also the best answer to itself.

A big problem with their "solutions" to brainstorm (and other 1 drop cards) is that they keep trying to slot them into blue. DRS is an interesting card because it's not blue and has become ubiquitous. But... I'm not sure I hate that. It's certainly not any *more* oppressive than brainstorm is.

[Noctalor]

How long do you guys think legacy is going to last as a paper format?

I truly belive that either the reserved goes away or legacy does in a matter of a few years, we are reaching an unbearable entry fee, currently, no player has a reason to start legacy, but most importantly, a lot of players with limited finances have a good reason to sell out

[morgan_coke]

How long do you guys think legacy is going to last as a paper format?

I truly belive that either the reserved goes away or legacy does in a matter of a few years, we are reaching an unbearable entry fee, currently, no player has a reason to start legacy, but most importantly, a lot of players with limited finances have a good reason to sell out

It will just go the way of paper Vintage, but more, because there are so many more copies of duals/forces than power/AQ.

[Lemnear]

DRS is an interesting card because it's not blue and has become ubiquitous. But... I'm not sure I hate that. It's certainly not any *more* oppressive than brainstorm is.

I think it's not that bold to claim that Deathrite IS a "blue card".

How long do you guys think legacy is going to last as a paper format?

I truly belive that either the reserved goes away or legacy does in a matter of a few years, we are reaching an unbearable entry fee, currently, no player has a reason to start legacy, but most importantly, a lot of players with limited finances have a good reason to sell out

Depends on how you define "last". I think it will inevitably slip into a comatose and degenerative state like Vintage once your manabase alone costs more than 2k. Some people will still love and play it, but that's the ones who have the cards for a decade and never had to bother with the entry fee of buying a deck (not to talk about a cardpool).

My personal believe is, that we crossed the point-of-no-return already due to price memory and how the format is handled in general (4 years of Miracle dominance *cough*). No one is going to pay a grand for a set of LEDs, Mox Diamonds, etc in a stagnant meta of DRS + BlueShell + killoption of choice. Just invest the money into an appartment, buy a PS4 and avoid traveling to events to shake unwashed hands.

[Megadeus]

I think it's not that bold to claim that Deathrite IS a "blue card".



Depends on how you define "last". I think it will inevitably slip into a comatose and degenerative state like Vintage once your manabase alone costs more than 2k. Some people will still love and play it, but that's the ones who have the cards for a decade and never had to bother with the entry fee of buying a deck (not to talk about a cardpool).

My personal believe is, that we crossed the point-of-no-return already due to price memory and how the format is handled in general (4 years of Miracle dominance *cough*). No one is going to pay a grand for a set of LEDs, Mox Diamonds, etc in a stagnant meta of DRS + BlueShell + killoption of choice. Just invest the money into an appartment, buy a PS4 and avoid traveling to events to shake unwashed hands.

I agree with this besides the last point (I love traveling for events it's my favorite thing about the game), but otherwise it seems pretty spot on. I just hate how expensive legacy has gotten. Personally I can afford to keep a deck together, but as a brewer it's much more difficult. I think the prices have both stunted growth and diversity and it is really disappointing. The format has been pretty stale even before the most recent bans and we pretty much predicted how it would shake out after the ban. I know back when prices were more affordable (at least on my standards) I saw now diversity and just more people in general. At this point weeklies outside of the tusks have become the same 20-30 people coming and playing the same decks. And that's from an area that used to be far more diverse with a pool of 60-70+ and half of them having multiple decks.

[Lemnear]

I agree with this besides the last point (I love traveling for events it's my favorite thing about the game), but otherwise it seems pretty spot on.

I do enjoy traveling, i am just not sure i wanna spend it in sweaty halls (partly without air conditioning like GP Lille Day 1), rather than going out and see the city, seaside, etc.

Maybe it's just a personal shift of priorities. I'm old :)

I just hate how expensive legacy has gotten. Personally I can afford to keep a deck together, but as a brewer it's much more difficult.

Brewing and testing is most of the fun if you ask me. Unfortunately the times, where you dropped 50-100 bucks to turn your tempo deck into a midrange one or move from NicFit to Survival for Paper testing or just a few enjoyable evenings at your local store are gone too long. All you can do now is running decks full of basic lands plus slips of paper (given you dont get confused with boardstates that way). Not my definition of fun with the game.

I see already a problem with keeping some decks up to date within the meta shifts in regards to main- and sideboard. It's not that you can move from Grixis to Pile for 50 bucks given the prices of Snapcasters, Leovolds and possibly another Dual for the green splash. Updating my own storm manabase in Paper would require me to drop a grand given the current prices. I am at the point of questioning myself, if I am actually interrested in doing so, or use the money for other things. Edit: Maybe it's more about if I can still justify it.

I think the prices have both stunted growth and diversity and it is really disappointing. The format has been pretty stale even before the most recent bans and we pretty much predicted how it would shake out after the ban.

There are no two opinions in regards to the format being stagnant due to the B&R management, prices (as people cant switch decks that fast/easily due to cost) and lack of new players/ideas (see: your mentioned testing/brewing). Personally i had expected other color combinations than BUgx become viable after SDTs ban, as Decay is no longer mandatory to break the counterbalance lock, but i was obviously wrong. Instead we moved from Miracles vs BUgx to a one-shell format.

I know back when prices were more affordable (at least on my standards) I saw now diversity and just more people in general. At this point weeklies outside of the tusks have become the same 20-30 people coming and playing the same decks. And that's from an area that used to be far more diverse with a pool of 60-70+ and half of them having multiple decks.

It's the effect which was talked about prior in this thread. If no new players enter the format, the community gets older and older people have simply different priorities. I don't have to look further than into a mirror to see a dood, who is unwilling to ride an hour (one way) with publics to the store after work, if I could spend time with Family and friends on the lake or BBQing in the sun instead these days. Working out, Networking for business, etc are all rivaling the game for the time spent. We need new blood to keep the community alive while you are gone abd buisy with other things, so there is still a community left once you have/take your free evening to return to the tables.