All B/R update speculation.

[Arsenal]

That was an ugly looking top 8 for SCG St. Louis. Once again, blue dominates and the only two decks that weren't blue were blue-predators.

[AngryTroll]

That was an ugly looking top 8 for SCG St. Louis. Once again, blue dominates and the only two decks that weren't blue were blue-predators.

Top 16:

Imperial Painter
RUG Delver
Esper Deathblade
Esper Deathblade
UWR Delver
Lands
Shardless BUG
UWR Delver
Death and Taxes
Maverick
Jund
Reanimator
Goblins
UWR Delver
Reanimator
UWr Miracles

I see:
6 different decks in the Top 8,
12 different decks in the Top 16,
10/16 Blue/Brainstorm/Force of Will decks,
5/16 TNN decks (13 total maindeck),
6/16 decks with Stoneforge,
2 different combo decks (2 Reanimator and 1 Painter), (and Lands?)
2 different control decks (D&T and Miracles), (and lands?)
1 Tempo deck,
and lots of midrange decks (including Maverick, Jund, and Goblins).

That Top 16 looks awesome.

[Arsenal]

I used to use Top 16 data, but then was told that I shouldn't as you couldn't compare other Top 16s because so few Top 16 results are posted (I think SCG is the only one that releases Top 16 info), so I should just stick to Top 8s as you can always compare Top 8s in order to aggregate raw data.

I love seeing Jund, Maverick and Goblins, but would really like to see them consistently in the Top 8 as to normalize the meta. Way too much blue at the top tables with the nonblue decks on the outside looking in (btw, this was not the case from Jan-Oct 2013).

[testing32]

Top 16:

I see:
6 different decks in the Top 8,
12 different decks in the Top 16,
10/16 Blue/Brainstorm/Force of Will decks,
5/16 TNN decks (13 total maindeck),
6/16 decks with Stoneforge,
2 different combo decks (2 Reanimator and 1 Painter), (and Lands?)
2 different control decks (D&T and Miracles), (and lands?)
1 Tempo deck,
and lots of midrange decks (including Maverick, Jund, and Goblins).

That Top 16 looks awesome.

I see:

25% of the top 16 decks are delver/tempo and 38% of the top 8.
44% of the top 16 decks run SFM and 50% of the top 8
62% of the top 16 decks run BS and 75% of the top 8

That Top 16 looks awesome.

[Ellomdian]

One of the reasons they stopped printing extreme colour hosers was that it made Limited somewhat starnge to draft/play/sideboard. Have you drafted Triple US? I really love it but, oh man those CoPs...

RoP's, and they were even worse - you could CYCLE them. Yeesh...

Top 16:

<Insert actual analysis here>

That Top 16 looks awesome.

But if the Top 16 contains a TNN, or a Brainstorm, cue the wailing and gnashing of teeth.

I feel like the biggest problem with TNN right now is that SCG seems obliged to put the most boring match-ups on camera in deference to their favorite players. I am pretty sure that there is a much more interesting match SOMEWHERE in the Top 5-6 tables than multiple rounds of BUG/Stoneblade/Vomit. Send Cedric out in round 2-3 to find something interesting in the middle tables, and then cut to obligatory-camera-face if the round goes short.

At this point, I would like to see something unbanned in the next cycle more than I would like to see something banned. For chrissakes, Dark Depths is a thing in serious legacy. If that's not indicative of a 'healthy' environment, I'm not sure what is.

[testing32]

https://www.wizards.com/magic/magazi...y/feature/161b

Excerpt from the mental misstep banning:
"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."

Here their main complaint is that a single color is dominating over all of the other colors. I don't have any data to back this up but I would be willing to bet that top 8s are now more blue than they were when mental misstep was around. I'm amazed a B&R change didn't happen this time.

Edit - I found some stuff. The 4 SCG Legacy opens before the bannings. The blue deck numbers seem comparable to now.

http://sales.starcitygames.com//deck...20&city=Boston

7/8 Blue

http://sales.starcitygames.com//deck...14&event_ID=20

5/8 Blue

http://sales.starcitygames.com//deck...ity=Pittsburgh

4/8 Blue

http://sales.starcitygames.com//deck...11&event_ID=20

7/8 Blue

AND, as a bonus, Ellomdian, there is a dark depths list in one of those top 8s. This clearly demonstrates a healthy metagame.

[Arsenal]

But if the Top 16 contains a TNN, or a Brainstorm, cue the wailing and gnashing of teeth.

The Top 16 doesn't contain a Brainstorm, it contains 40 of them. And if you look at just the Top 8, then there's 24 copies of Brainstorm. Since November 1st, 2013, the penetration of Brainstorm in Top 8s has risen to unprecedented levels, far surpassing the penetration of Mental Misstep in it's respective era.

I realize that Brainstorm will never be banned, but to marginalize the people unhappy with Brainstorm is silly as they have every reason to want a ban if these rediculous numbers continue to hold.

[btm10]

That was an ugly looking top 8 for SCG St. Louis. Once again, blue dominates and the only two decks that weren't blue were blue-predators.

I take issue with the characterization of the other decks as "blue-predators". Painter isn't a blue predator, it's a greedy-manabase predator. Most of the greedy manabases (but not all) are in UXY decks, but Painter players don't go into a game saying "lol you're playing blue and I have REB maindeck and Blood Moon to nerf your splashes", they say "lol nonbasics". And let's not forget that the deck also runs a silver bullet Jaya Ballard that operates with a combo piece that's particularly vulnerable to the blue decks (all of which are running nonblue creature removal). It's insane to suggest that Painter is "anti-blue".

Similarly, Lands is basically slow Dredge in that it operates on a totally different axis than everyone else and gains value that way, but makes itself vulnerable to graveyard hate in the process. It's just as indifferent to discard as it is to countermagic because its CA engine is recurrable and its threats are, too, and is particularly resilient to creature based strategies. Isn't more decks like Lands exactly what you're hoping for?

[Arsenal]

As you pointed out, many of the relevant nonbasic heavy decks are blue. I think you're just splitting hairs if you think "anti-nonbasics" is drastically different from "anti-blue" in the context of Legacy. And yes, running maindeck 6 Blast/REB and 1 Jaya Ballard, even without taking the other components of the deck into consideration, is pretty much the definition of "anti-blue".

[Dzra]

I realize that Brainstorm will never be banned, but to marginalize the people unhappy with Brainstorm is silly as they have every reason to want a ban if these ridiculous numbers continue to hold.

Brainstorm's primary function is to ensure consistency. Whether this means mitigating the natural inconsistency of nonlinear decks or helping combo decks find their various pieces, the function remains the same. If you'll notice, almost* every successful deck either has Brainstorm or has some sort of alternative consistency mechanism (Life from the Loam, Imperial Recruiter, Green Sun's Zenith, Stoneforge Mystic, the Dredge mechanic, Goblin Ringleader, Survival of the Fittest, etc).

The reason that Brainstorm sees the most play out of all these consistency mechanisms is simple: it has the least number of deck-building restrictions attached to it. Let me say that again because it's worth repeating: the reason Brainstorm sees the most play is not because it is the most powerful consistency enabler; it is because Brainstorm has the least intrusive restriction. In fact, the only one it has is "must play fetchlands." This is opposed to restrictions like "must play Green creatures" or "must want cards in the graveyard" or "must have relevant 2-power creatures," etc. Solutions that would likely make everyone happy are to either print good generalized (low-restriction) consistency mechanisms in other colors (for example, a Faithless Looting that cantrips) or to simply print enough narrow consistency enablers/engines so that more strategies will have access to them.**


*Some decks attempt to rely on pure card advantage and card quality in order to mitigate inconsistency (ie Jund).

**Giving White an Imperial Recruiter isn't a bad idea, although Black is even worse off when it comes to consistency mechanisms, and let's not forget colorless either. I could definitely imagine some sort of colorless, very narrow but very playable consistency enabler whose restriction revolves around artifacts.

[PirateKing]

If we're picking on cards based on their penetration into the top 16, then how about the alarming number of dual and fetch lands? 82 dual lands in the top 16, and a massive 123 fetch lands! Some even appearing in monocolor decks! If our intention is truly format diversity as measured by low numbers of cards appearing at the top ranks of decks, by golly we've found public enemy number one.

Please prepare the shouts for the "pillar of the format" and to go play modern and all that tired rhetoric accordingly.

[Arsenal]

I certainly don't believe that penetration is what matters, I apologize if my post came off as such. I was merely responding to a comment about how a Brainstorm in a Top 16 causes people to gnash their teeth. This characterization of the situation wasn't close to reality as the numbers clearly show that there is more than just a single copy of Brainstorm in the Top 16.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

It is a pretty clear upset of precedent to ignore representation over time and ubiquity in looking at bannings, so if people are proposing doing so they really ought to say why and what alternate basis for deciding bannings they want to rely on.

I strongly suspect that no one can actually lay out abstract and reasonable-sounding criteria for banning that wouldn't cover Brainstorm at the current time.

Also, no, duals+fetches is not equivalent to Brainstorm. The first is a set of 20 cards, the latter is a set of 1 card.

[Secretly.A.Bee]

So what is an acceptable amount of blue, Barook/Arsenal/IBA? How many Brainstorm/Delver/TNN could we see in t8/t16 that would allow you to not disrupt my otherwise peaceful enjoyment of The Source? I'm sure we will all work to accommodate you so long as you stop screaming like a 5-year-old in the middle of wal-mart.

Sent from my SM-N900V using Tapatalk

[Dzra]

I strongly suspect that no one can actually lay out abstract and reasonable-sounding criteria for banning that wouldn't cover Brainstorm at the current time.

A card should be banned when it hinders format diversity to the point where the only competitive decks either play said card or revolve around specifically preying on said card.

[apple713]

Brainstorm's primary function is to ensure consistency. Whether this means mitigating the natural inconsistency of nonlinear decks or helping combo decks find their various pieces, the function remains the same. If you'll notice, almost* every successful deck either has Brainstorm or has some sort of alternative consistency mechanism (Life from the Loam, Imperial Recruiter, Green Sun's Zenith, Stoneforge Mystic, the Dredge mechanic, Goblin Ringleader, Survival of the Fittest, etc).

The reason that Brainstorm sees the most play out of all these consistency mechanisms is simple: it has the least number of deck-building restrictions attached to it. Let me say that again because it's worth repeating: the reason Brainstorm sees the most play is not because it is the most powerful consistency enabler; it is because Brainstorm has the least intrusive restriction. In fact, the only one it has is "must play fetchlands." This is opposed to restrictions like "must play Green creatures" or "must want cards in the graveyard" or "must have relevant 2-power creatures," etc. Solutions that would likely make everyone happy are to either print good generalized (low-restriction) consistency mechanisms in other colors (for example, a Faithless Looting that cantrips) or to simply print enough narrow consistency enablers/engines so that more strategies will have access to them.**


*Some decks attempt to rely on pure card advantage and card quality in order to mitigate inconsistency (ie Jund).

**Giving White an Imperial Recruiter isn't a bad idea, although Black is even worse off when it comes to consistency mechanisms, and let's not forget colorless either. I could definitely imagine some sort of colorless, very narrow but very playable consistency enabler whose restriction revolves around artifacts.

I believe the card you are looking for is senseis divining top. Black is significantly more consistent than red and white. It actually has draw spells and tutors. Red and white pretty much fail. Imperial recruiter is a creature tutor in red so its application is limited.

If we're picking on cards based on their penetration into the top 16, then how about the alarming number of dual and fetch lands? 82 dual lands in the top 16, and a massive 123 fetch lands! Some even appearing in monocolor decks! If our intention is truly format diversity as measured by low numbers of cards appearing at the top ranks of decks, by golly we've found public enemy number one.

Please prepare the shouts for the "pillar of the format" and to go play modern and all that tired rhetoric accordingly.

Lands are required for decks to function. Its also the reason why they are the most expensive cards in the game. Brainstorm is 100% optional.

[Dzra]

Black is significantly more consistent than red and white.

There are no competitive mono-Black decks for a reason. Bob is good, but is CA rather than card quality and comes with the restriction "must play low-costing spells." I didn't mention Infernal Tutor because it is only run in Blue decks. I agree that Red and White could use a lot of help, but in my opinion Black is still one of the worse off. Regardless, it might be easier to look at enablers from a strategic standpoint rather than a color standpoint. Creating more creature-type or creating card-type specific engines might be an interesting way to catapult some new decks into being.

Sensei's Divining Top is a good example; it's somewhat mysterious why it doesn't see more penetration. Perhaps the effect of simply filtering cards is not powerful enough when compared to tutors like Stoneforge Mystic, Imperial Recruiter, and Green Sun's Zenith.

[Barook]

If we're picking on cards based on their penetration into the top 16, then how about the alarming number of dual and fetch lands? 82 dual lands in the top 16, and a massive 123 fetch lands! Some even appearing in monocolor decks! If our intention is truly format diversity as measured by low numbers of cards appearing at the top ranks of decks, by golly we've found public enemy number one.

Please prepare the shouts for the "pillar of the format" and to go play modern and all that tired rhetoric accordingly.

Ironically, banning fetchlands would be quite the nerf for Brainstorm. It would also make all those three-colored decks look pretty silly in the face of Wasteland.

#banislands

the reason Brainstorm sees the most play is not because it is the most powerful consistency enabler; it is because Brainstorm has the least intrusive restriction.

But Brainstorm is the most powerful consistency enabler because it has the least restrictions, hence it being so abundant in the format.

A card should be banned when it hinders format diversity to the point where the only competitive decks either play said card or revolve around specifically preying on said card.

Thanks for describing the the current state of the format. The recent Top 8's have consistently a ridiculous high percentage of BS (75+%). That's higher than MM ever was. And preying on BS is impossible since good BS hate does not exist. Spirit of the Labyrinth has several shortcomings, CotV forces you into running a deck with suboptimal card choices, REB/Pyroblast trade 1-for-1 at best, etc. - if we had good BS hate that gets the job done, people would actually run it en masse. Thalia making BS cost doesn't stop it in the slightest.

Edit:

There are no competitive mono-Black decks for a reason. Bob is good, but is CA rather than card quality and comes with the restriction "must play low-costing spells."

While this is true, Mono-Black has other issues as well. It can neither deal with enchantments (meh) nor artifacts (that can be a big one, unless you count artifact solutions) and its main disruption, discard, folds to Brainstorm.

Edit2:

So what is an acceptable amount of blue, Barook/Arsenal/IBA? How many Brainstorm/Delver/TNN could we see in t8/t16 that would allow you to not disrupt my otherwise peaceful enjoyment of The Source? I'm sure we will all work to accommodate you so long as you stop screaming like a 5-year-old in the middle of wal-mart.

I consider 50% BS as still okay (basically, pre-Delver meta), 60% is already at the threshold, but 75+%? That's way over the line. Mental Misstep got banned for less format penetration. We're talking about "being required to play Brainstorm to be competitive"-levels here. It's impossible to ever reach near 100% for various reasons.

Ban TNN and see how how the meta shifts back.

[btm10]

As you pointed out, many of the relevant nonbasic heavy decks are blue. I think you're just splitting hairs if you think "anti-nonbasics" is drastically different from "anti-blue" in the context of Legacy. And yes, running maindeck 6 Blast/REB and 1 Jaya Ballard, even without taking the other components of the deck into consideration, is pretty much the definition of "anti-blue".

I posit that if you created a bunch of non-Blue-based 3 and 4 color decks (i.e, they just splash blue for Brainstorm or something like that) Painter would run very nearly the same maindeck. And my point is that the damage to Blue decks in incidental so long as the level of nonbasic land penetration remains high. The REBs and Jaya Ballard aren't main for when they run into Blue decks, they're (and this is particularly true of Jaya) there to remove problematic permanents like Pithing Needles, Leylines of Sanctity, and Phyrexian Revokers when the Painter player is ready to go off and to function as counters to protect your stuff from removal, particularly in the "digging for Grindstone" phase of the game. Hitting the Blue player's spells and Delvers is just gravy, and Jaya's Incinerate is also important and is indifferent to whether the opponent is playing Blue.

The point about Lands still stands.

[PirateKing]

Ironically, banning fetchlands would be quite the nerf for Brainstorm. It would also make all those three-colored decks look pretty silly in the face of Wasteland.

No irony, I am more on board wit this than the Brainstorm arguments. Hearing the people complain about how it enables sloppy keeps due to free mulligans, but hyper greedy mana base gets a free pass? If we want to talk a long hard look at our beloved format, then it better be a long, hard look. The arguments for color balance are pretty weak when everybody has access to any color without penalty. But then someone steps in and says that what we're all about right? But then that's not good enough. We don't have "pillars" like Vintage.