All B/R update speculation.

[H]

Let's calm down on the rhetoric/boardline personal insults, please, thanks.

[Grizzlenasty]

Let's calm down on the rhetoric/boardline personal insults, please, thanks.

Sure, I'm up for that. Sry y'all.


congrats on the good finish without BS.
Lovely, thx! But of course a lot of luck and opponents not knowing what they really were up against was involved in that.



i turn 2'd a 20/20 and promptly lost to a BS>S&T>Sneak>emrakul. it happens...
...even to the best.
As I pilot both decks(rg lands and SnT) I know which side of the table I'd want to sit on.



my only crusade is against BS. fetches are fine, so was SDT and Deathrite.
Honestly, when it's about Magic, I had the time of my life with Bant Countertop in ~2010/11. God did I enjoy myself and my opponents misery. I was devastated when I came back after a bigger pause, only to find out SDT was banned.
I'd be fine with DRS if 1.)it was x/1 and 2.)not castable off Usea.



no other card does what BS does and it completely warps legacy. would breach and W&6 need a ban without BS in the format? would Oko be so dominant without BS?

Warps? Enriches! ;P

I think W6 would've needed to go anyways. Sniping basically most Legacy creatures plus Wastelock and uncounted land shenanigans is a bit rough for only 2 mana.
At least without widespread countermeasures.
I've played him in Jund and even there he reigned terror in my playgroup. Missed the chance to take him to an actual tournament though.
Can't talk about breach. As I only play in paper I've never encountered it.



don't mind me, i'll be jousting at windmills with my buddy don...

I thoroghly hope you'll be jousting for ever <3

[Wrath of Pie]

Let's calm down on the rhetoric/boardline personal insults, please, thanks.
Use your magical edit powers to change the insult posts into comedy. It would improve the thread massively, after all.

[H]

Use your magical edit powers to change the insult posts into comedy. It would improve the thread massively, after all.

I already have a full-time job, :cool:.

[Wrath of Pie]

I already have a full-time job, :cool:.

Fair point, surviving this thread is a full-time job.

[H]

https://i.imgur.com/tVIUEeX.png

No idea what "address the Companion mechanic" means, or the scope of what it might entail.

Plausible that it might change how it works for all formats though. I don't think there will be any clarification until we see what they say though. As I've said though, I'd really like to see the mechanic just not work for Legacy and Vintage, this way the cards could still be used in some way.

[Cire]

https://i.imgur.com/tVIUEeX.png

No idea what "address the Companion mechanic" means, or the scope of what it might entail.

Plausible that it might change how it works for all formats though. I don't think there will be any clarification until we see what they say though. As I've said though, I'd really like to see the mechanic just not work for Legacy and Vintage, this way the cards could still be used in some way.

How much would the mechanic have to change for them to unban Lurrus or Zirda?

would this work? "at the beginning of the game shuffle a card back [at random] and put your companion in your hand." - variance is a problem, but no CA, no LED interaction and vulnerable to discard . . .

[Fox]

Simply fixing the mull disparity would go a long way. Putting the card in hand is highly unlikely; 1-mana [discard] completely invalidating building a deck with restrictions seems unlikely.

[FTW]

would this work? "at the beginning of the game shuffle a card back [at random] and put your companion in your hand." - variance is a problem, but no CA, no LED interaction and vulnerable to discard . . .

All they need is
"If you reveal a companion, your opening hand counts as your first mulligan"

That fixes Lurrus and companion in most formats, but not Legacy Zirda.

Zirda isn't busted because of the card advantage, but because it says "you may start with Power Artifact in the Command Zone" and has virtually no restrictions for a spell-based combo deck. Turning Monoliths into a 1-card infinite mana combo is a bit broken.

[H]

Well, they could just change the mechanic to only work in EDH, Standard and Historic, then ban what needs to be in those formats. They could also change how it works in those formats to make them less OP as well (lower the starting card number, or something).

I don't know that they will actually do either, but it seems possible at least.

[PirateKing]

They could just add a cost.
Companion is ":3:: You may play your companion from outside the game. Activate once per game. (You still pay it's cost)"

[itslarryyo]

They could build a time-machine not make companions.

I bet they jusy keep banning/restricting :frown:

[H]

I bet they jusy keep banning/restricting :frown:

Well, their own wording doesn't make too much sense then. But, we have to just wait and see what they really meant.

[Humphrey]

You will be able to exchange a card from your opener with the companion. Or maybe at any point if they want to protect them.

[PirateKing]

https://m.twitch.tv/clip/SpunkyTardyScallionM4xHeh

Companion rules are going to change, maybe they'll get it right this time

[jmlima]

https://m.twitch.tv/clip/SpunkyTardyScallionM4xHeh

Companion rules are going to change, maybe they'll get it right this time

Whilst positive, it's even more upheaval for all formats. There's just no semblance or normality any more, it's a constant throw of the dice with every release and in the months after the release. If this just affected standard I would be kind of ok with it, but it's now pervasive to all formats, there's no way anymore of buying a deck and sticking to it, you need a library to be able to compete competitively or to accept continuous selling and buying.

[H]

Whilst positive, it's even more upheaval for all formats. There's just no semblance or normality any more, it's a constant throw of the dice with every release and in the months after the release. If this just affected standard I would be kind of ok with it, but it's now pervasive to all formats, there's no way anymore of buying a deck and sticking to it, you need a library to be able to compete competitively or to accept continuous selling and buying.

Well, I disagree. There are/were decks that were "competitive" that were not Companion decks. UG Omni, for example. Were they better than Companion decks? Maybe not, but they are still competitive with them. Even RUG Delver never bothered to run a Companion and it stayed fairly viable, if indeed "clearly" below the Lurrus Delver decks.

There will always be "continuous buying" since there will always be new cards. As for "continuous selling," well, I am not sure what to say. I honestly can't imagine trying to do this hobby with the notion of having to continually sell everything to buy something else. To me, once I buy it, it is mine and I am not going to sell it. I don't consider cards an investment or anything like that. To me, it is no different than buying food, or any other consumable. Sure, Magic cards are not actually consumed, but in the same sense, I buy them, I use them and I don't look to get my money back.

I don't know, I realize I am not exactly "in touch with" the majority of Magic players and while this whole Companion debacle is just that, some aspects leave me scratching my head a bit. Then again, I haven't had my coffee this morning yet...

[jmlima]

Well, I disagree. There are/were decks that were "competitive" that were not Companion decks. UG Omni, for example. Were they better than Companion decks? Maybe not, but they are still competitive with them. Even RUG Delver never bothered to run a Companion and it stayed fairly viable, if indeed "clearly" below the Lurrus Delver decks.

There will always be "continuous buying" since there will always be new cards. As for "continuous selling," well, I am not sure what to say. I honestly can't imagine trying to do this hobby with the notion of having to continually sell everything to buy something else. To me, once I buy it, it is mine and I am not going to sell it. I don't consider cards an investment or anything like that. To me, it is no different than buying food, or any other consumable. Sure, Magic cards are not actually consumed, but in the same sense, I buy them, I use them and I don't look to get my money back.

I don't know, I realize I am not exactly "in touch with" the majority of Magic players and while this whole Companion debacle is just that, some aspects leave me scratching my head a bit. Then again, I haven't had my coffee this morning yet...

We are broadly agreeing since I'm not aiming at companion in specific. With regards to buying and selling, I play only online and, my view and mileage varies for everyone, you have to continuously either pump money into it or sell your deck to buy something relevant for the new meta, this is becoming a continuous process now. I never envisaged rental but these days it's really the only viable option as otherwise you are continuously losing money. The other option, you do what I ended up doing, sell the lot and sit it out until things come to a semblance of any stability. It's not about not wanting to change your pet deck, it's about the fact that online things move so fast that, say breach, that things was horrendously pervasive, you either could beat it or, if not, you had maybe 10% chance of getting your entry back in the leagues. So, what to do? Well, join the arms race. Until breach is banned and then something else comes, and so on. It's this process I find fatiguing. Maybe this new world of 'magic the banning' is just not for me anymore.

[H]

We are broadly agreeing since I'm not aiming at companion in specific. With regards to buying and selling, I play only online and, my view and mileage varies for everyone, you have to continuously either pump money into it or sell your deck to buy something relevant for the new meta, this is becoming a continuous process now. I never envisaged rental but these days it's really the only viable option as otherwise you are continuously losing money. The other option, you do what I ended up doing, sell the lot and sit it out until things come to a semblance of any stability. It's not about not wanting to change your pet deck, it's about the fact that online things move so fast that, say breach, that things was horrendously pervasive, you either could beat it or, if not, you had maybe 10% chance of getting your entry back in the leagues. So, what to do? Well, join the arms race. Until breach is banned and then something else comes, and so on. It's this process I find fatiguing. Maybe this new world of 'magic the banning' is just not for me anymore.

Well, yes, I do think we mostly agree here. I think the key of this is how it reveals how atavistic and antiquated the distribution model really is. This really wouldn't be a "problem" if you, for example, were more readily able to switch decks, by way of staples being more available and at a lower cost. Then, it wouldn't make much of a difference if you switched from RUG Delver to Grixis (for Lurrus) and then right back, post ban.

I think the notion of Legacy or Vintage (even Modern or Pioneer) as less "churn" based is likely unfounded now. It will churn at some rate now and if you aren't set up to use the churn to your advantage (that is, have a large pool of staples to pull from) you are likely to be facing some burn-out. The days where you could keep, essentially, the same deck for 5 years and be approximately competitive is mostly a pipe-dream, unless your core is URx Delver or UWx Miracles. Aside those, we could be headed nearly anywhere.

[Fox]

Loam/Mox is pretty stable too, but you’d also need to own a Tabernacle. You’re also always going to be fine as either Cavern/Vial (DnT) or SnT (option to change to Sol Land/Chalice not overly expensive you’ve got City). The cost rising argument is harder to make I think with the printing of Vista and Astrolabe. Every so often an expensive card is banned (Wrenn), but those should be pretty easy to see coming. On the flip side Oko (another card that should be banned) has crashed to ~$15 from the $80+ it would be at if still legal in other formats, and Uro will crash once he rotates out (without risk of being banned in legacy, even now you’d only be lighting about $15/copy on fire buying high).

Legacy isn’t all that punishing even if you bought a deck like Breach; LEDs are easy to trade off, and you could also turn it into DDFT with pretty minimal investment. You’d need to make a decision on U-Sea, but again it’s a stable investment. Another option is getting one more dual and playing 3c pile or two more duals and 4c pile (those LEDs are close to trading 1-for-1 with duals).

Legacy isn’t going anywhere until Oko is banned; the archetype is full of pilots who can’t win with Hymn/Snapcaster or Counterbalance (vs Oko). Everyone else is doing the same thing (without cantrips) b/c Oko is unmanageable (Lands/Loam/Maverick, etc...), but the decks underneath that $45-60 of Okos are the same thing as they used to be who happen to now own ~2x more blue duals (usually Trop).

Outside of Sol Land/Chalice, which has no control over whether or not it’s relevant, most decks in legacy are pretty safe from noticeable cost swings. The jank fair decks should have always known that without strategy (just a pile of “good” cards you jam off the top under any circumstance) that they are just worse Czech. The only difference is that they can go around cheese’ing Oko and not always get called on doing the same thing, but worse, b/c Oko is an absurd 1-card combo.

[Mr. Safety]

Predictions on today's announcement about companions? I think the cleanest answer is ban them in eternal formats, however I think the likely action will be that you must take an automatic 'mulligan' (start the game by only drawing 6 cards instead of 7) if announcing a companion.

EDIT: misleading text

[jmlima]

Predictions on today's announcement about companions? I think the cleanest answer is ban them in eternal formats, however I think the likely action will be that you must take an automatic mulligan if announcing a companion (starting hand of 6 cards.)

Why do you need a mulligan? Just make the companion announcement the first action of the game (before drawing your hand) and then just draw 6 cards. No need for even more deck handling.

[Mr. Safety]

Why do you need a mulligan? Just make the companion announcement the first action of the game (before drawing your hand) and then just draw 6 cards. No need for even more deck handling.

That's essentially what I meant. It's a functional 'mulligan', not a technical one. Sorry I didn't explain better.

[jmlima]

That's essentially what I meant. It's a functional 'mulligan', not a technical one. Sorry I didn't explain better.

Gotcha. I still think they will ban them in everything other than standard.

[H]

They could just add a cost.
Companion is ":3:: You may play your companion from outside the game. Activate once per game. (You still pay it's cost)"
Good call: https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/news/june-1-2020-banned-and-restricted-announcement


New Companion Rule:

Once per game, any time you could cast a sorcery (during your main phase when the stack is empty), you can pay 3 generic mana to put your companion from your sideboard into your hand. This is a special action, not an activated ability.

[Fox]

nvm special action

[Ronald Deuce]

Good call: https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/news/june-1-2020-banned-and-restricted-announcement

So I guess the question now is whether this'll torpedo all the cards. Is eight mana for a Yorion worth a Yorion?

EDIT: And did they kill my beloved Gigan?

[Cire]

Prescient PirateKing 1U
Legendary Creature - Pirate King (M)
When Prescient PirateKing enters the battlefield make a change to the magic rules. That change takes effect next game.
2/1

[jmlima]

Good call: https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/news/june-1-2020-banned-and-restricted-announcement

They also nuked my standard and historic decks. Personal grumble time, after pod, twin, eldrazi, drs, breach, pauper post / faeries / drake, now this. I'll start posting my decks so that you guys know what's going to be banned.

[Zombie]

Prescient PirateKing 1U
Legendary Creature - Pirate King (M)
When Prescient PirateKing enters the battlefield make a change to the magic rules. That change takes effect next game.
2/1

Proper typing would probably be Legendary Creature - Pirate Noble

[PirateKing]

So I guess the question now is whether this'll torpedo all the cards. Is eight mana for a Yorion worth a Yorion?

EDIT: And did they kill my beloved Gigan?

Well to be clear, this isn't 100% of what I said.
It's :3: to move it from your sideboard to your hand.

So 8 mana Yorion is only if you want to transfer it to your hand and then cast it at once.
What this really is doing is opening up discard as a viable avenue.

Do you spend the mana early to play Yorion out on turn 5 but risk a cheeky Cabal Therapy? Or like you said wait until the game is already decided before trying to jam his safely from his hidey-hole?

My question is: is this enough to see the others return from banning?
Seems nobody was playing Lurrus maindeck besides myself, so I'm especially invested in seeing it come off, but not if it's what MODO was those few weeks.
Zirda seems a bit more dangerous, the deck going infinite seems well suited to have an extra 3 colorless on hand.

[Cire]

My question is: is this enough to see the others return from banning?
Seems nobody was playing Lurrus maindeck besides myself, so I'm especially invested in seeing it come off, but not if it's what MODO was those few weeks.
Zirda seems a bit more dangerous, the deck going infinite seems well suited to have an extra 3 colorless on hand.

My thoughts on the change:

Gyruda - makes the deck more vulnerable to disruption (discard) and slows the deck down (either need 9 mana or get it into your hand the turn before). This makes the deck slightly worse but I don't think takes it out of competitiveness.

Zirda - the infinite combos are slightly more expensive but its still a consistent and explosive deck. I can see this remaining banned.

Keruga - These stompy decks were getting buzz from DJ Izma but I feel this change kills them.

Obosh - This change makes Obosh pointless.

Jegentha - I don't think this change effects Lands and RUG running this card - it was a late game play anyway. They spend 3 mana when they have nothing else to do and play it the turn after.

Lurrus - This is the big one - I think you can unban Lurrus now. No more LED into Lurrus, and slows down lurrus a whole turn where paying 3 to do nothing hurts the tempo Lurrus decks thrive on.

Yorion - The other big one. It definitely hurt Yorion decks but these decks play the long game anyway . . . they can afford to pay 3 one turn and the turn after cast Yorion and draw 4.

Kaherra - No creature decks that ran this just in case will probably stil ldo so, but those decks were far in between. Tribal decks will also probably continue to run it, but these tribal decks were never competitive.

Lutri - This change makes Lutri pointless as you can't take advantage of the tempo and even if you were using lutri for the suspend spell shennigans the set up now is too much IMO for Lutri

Umori - Lol

[Mr. Safety]

Some predictions:

1) I don't think the companions are playable now, due to the pure efficiency of Delver and combo decks.
2) Lurrus and Zirda won't be unbanned, even if my first statement proves correct.
3) The metagame will change within the next month or so, if Delver can start taking back a bigger share of the metagame.
4) Blew-stew (Astrolabe + Oko) will now be Public Enemy #1 again.

[Fox]

Lutri doesn’t care a huge amount, suspend 4 means you have time for 3 land drops, putting Lutri into hand, then untapping as suspend spell comes off. You’re not actually trying to copy the suspend spell anyways (vs any permission), you want Lutri there to make sure oppos can’t fight the suspend spell on the stack.

[Wrath of Pie]

Prescient PirateKing 1U
Legendary Creature - Pirate King (M)
When Prescient PirateKing enters the battlefield make a change to the magic rules. That change takes effect next game.
2/1

Needs flash and less vulnerability to Stifle.

[Cire]

Someone on reddit brought up that in Yorion decks this rule makes FOW slightly better by giving it another alternative cost:

It used to be either
- cast force for 0, exile a blue card, pay 1 life
- pay 3UU when you need to counter something

Now it is
- cast force for 0, exile a blue card, pay 1 life
- pay 3 in advance, then counter for free, pay 1 life
- pay 3UU when you need to counter something

[Reeplcheep]

Lunar force now legacy playable!

[talpa]

My thoughts on the change:

Gyruda - makes the deck more vulnerable to disruption (discard) and slows the deck down (either need 9 mana or get it into your hand the turn before). This makes the deck slightly worse but I don't think takes it out of competitiveness.

Except you can't cast a card that's already in your hand using LED mana.

[alphastryk]

Except you can't cast a card that's already in your hand using LED mana.

No, but if you have the 9 mana you can crack however many LEDs before using the "put in hand" ability, and LED can always pay for that ability

[Secretly.A.Bee]

No, but if you have the 9 mana you can crack however many LEDs before using the "put in hand" ability, and LED can always pay for that abilityAnd this is why Lurrus and Zirda stay banned even after the companion fix. The artifact deck can drop their hand, minimizing the effects of LED and continue on their broke AF way.

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk

[Cire]

5-0 results post companion rule change people are still playing companions including this cool Kahera Pox deck https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/mtgo-standings/legacy-league-2020-06-06#jgm_-

Total companion count is:

Yorion: 11
Lutri: 1
Keruga: 1
Jegantha: 1
Gyruda: 1
Kaheera: 1

Which is impressive since I thought all but Yorion to be dead.

[Ronald Deuce]

Total companion count is:

Yorion: 11
Lutri: 1
Keruga: 1
Jegantha: 1
Gyruda: 1
Kaheera: 1

Which is impressive since I thought all but Yorion to be dead.

I think the results demonstrate how much air people actually countenance having in their sideboards.

[Cire]

List from yesterday shows a much more limited companion showing with only 2 yorion lists and nothing else: https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/mtgo-standings/legacy-showcase-challenge-2020-06-08#lynnchalice_th_place

[jmlima]

List from yesterday shows a much more limited companion showing with only 2 yorion lists and nothing else: https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/mtgo-standings/legacy-showcase-challenge-2020-06-08#lynnchalice_th_place

Yup, same for the challenge of the 7th:

https://www.mtggoldfish.com/tournament/legacy-challenge-12165551#online

Even astrolabe, only at 25%...

Interestingly, with the companions going, the % for brainstorm also went down by almost 20% with brainstorm sitting now at 56%.

[Secretly.A.Bee]

Now, can we somehow fabricate an argument why fetchlands are culturally offensive?

Destroying amazon river for farmland?

Is as bad as sacing misty rainforest for savannahClassy...

[jmlima]

https://twitter.com/wizards_magic/status/1280564682009399296

Punxsutawney Phil came out and said snow will continue to fall.

[Fox]

Hope ya'll are ready for Uro to drop to a reasonable price. Doubt he's dodging the axe in the truly barbaric lands of no graveyard order.

Edit: bah, maybe next time :frown:

[Secretly.A.Bee]

Hope ya'll are ready for Uro to drop to a reasonable price. Doubt he's dodging the axe in the truly barbaric lands of no graveyard order.

Edit: bah, maybe next time :frown:I want Rest In Priest, so I hope the unfair graveyard trend continues so they will print one...

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk

[Mr. Safety]

Legacy was mentioned in the B&R announcement under the Modern section, where Astrolabe was banned. All of the same reasoning for banning Astrolabe in Modern apply to Legacy, but Astrolabe decks haven't reached a win percentage high enough to take action (their words, not mine.)

Here's the text:


Over the past several months of Modern’s metagame, we have seen a rise in popularity and win rate of multicolor decks using Arcum’s Astrolabe, with some variants approaching 55% non-mirror match win rate. While these decks have taken on several different forms, their common game plan is using Arcum’s Astrolabe to play powerful cards across several colors. As a result, Arcum’s Astrolabe has become one of the most played cards in Modern.

While there’s nothing intrinsically bad about multicolor “good stuff” decks having a place in the metagame, their power and flexibility is usually counterbalanced by making concessions in their mana bases, often through lands that enter the battlefield tapped, cost life, or involve some other deckbuilding restriction. Arcum’s Astrolabe makes this tradeoff come at too low of a cost, as one Arcum's Astrolabe can often mean excellent mana for the rest of the game, without costing a card. In addition, Arcum’s Astrolabe leads to other synergy by virtue of being a cheap artifact permanent, and it can be blinked or recurred for card advantage. In short, Arcum’s Astrolabe adds too much to these decks for too little cost, resulting in win rates that are unhealthy and unsustainable for the metagame. Therefore, Arcum’s Astrolabe is banned in Modern.

We’re keeping an eye on Arcum’s Astrolabe in Legacy for similar reasons, although at present the play rates and win rates of Arcum's Astrolabe decks don’t warrant action. We’re aware of concerns among the Legacy community on this point but want to be consistent with our philosophy of only resorting to bans when a card or deck reaches problematic win rates that can’t be solved by natural metagame forces.

[jmlima]

Legacy was mentioned in the B&R announcement under the Modern section, where Astrolabe was banned. All of the same reasoning for banning Astrolabe in Modern apply to Legacy, but Astrolabe decks haven't reached a win percentage high enough to take action (their words, not mine.)

Here's the text:

The way they are dealing with pauper is just another example of how little they think (or not) before acting. Over these past year they tried their best to kill delver decks, there was plenty of people warning that it would only lead to tron becoming a rampant beast. Of course, it did, so here we are now banning pieces of tron. Deck diversity reduces, the format gets dumber by the day, but hey, I bet someone will find a logic in this sequence of actions.

[Wrath of Pie]

I think their goal is to try to make midrange viable in Pauper, but the card pool does not support that very well, so the aggro decks go wide so fast that the best available answer to that is fog effects, and with the recursion effects in Pauper, the Tron manabase is the easiest way to get to the mana needed to trigger as many fog effects as needed.

I doubt that Expedition Map makes enough of a difference, because it does not solve the fundamental issue that Pauper needs better sweepers to make midrange even viable. Of course, said sweepers are usually put at uncommon for a reason, so maybe it is just Pauper's destiny to be aggro vs. fog control.

[jmlima]

... so maybe it is just Pauper's destiny to be aggro vs. fog control.

I actually think they just want to be 'turn my creatures sideways, now your turn your creatures sideways'. But hey, they listen to the 'format experts' whose articles preached for years that delver and blue needed to be totally nerfed, but never once predicted what would happen afterwards. Now, those same 'experts' have been banging the drum against tron. I wonder what those guys actually play.

[Sella]

probably Brawl

[Fox]

Hopefully they'll do a rules update at some point that allows you to activate companion special action at instant speed if the companion has flash. Make legacy an otter format again :frown:

[Sigi85]

Hello everybody!
I’m wrong or legacy was not so bad since treasure cruise era?
Really all this veil,oko,astrolab and grave sinergy...I’m really too nostalgic of the sensei’s top and deathrite era...
In my opinion was the best metà I have played and I’m glad I could enjoy it!
Now I see too many grave combo...wasteland that is not good like before...
I really hope in a good ban this time...

[Grizzlenasty]

I'm with you.
Labe needs to go, Veil needs to go.
But people were crying for "Modern with OG Duals" and that's what they've gotten.
Basically it was this way when I started playing what? 15 years ago and it probably will always be this way. People want to play broken stuff or a load of creatures mostly uninterupted and interacted with as little as possible. They'd probably play solitaire if they didn't thirst for someone admiring their greatness.Thus the "Blue is op, here eat my 15 goblins turn three" attitude. But that's another story.
40%Aggro, 40%Combo and 20%Control, of wich half of the decks are 4-5c Labeshit because nothing else seems viable enough with all the hate for control.. but that is what sounds healthy to an overwhelming majority it seems.

[Sella]

I'd love to see Labe at the very least eat a ban. Make Wasteland Great Again

[Fox]

I'd love to see Labe at the very least eat a ban. Make Wasteland Great Again

Oko will scavenge for any future 1cmc trinket which draws a card without being sacrificed. Doesn't matter what it does, Oko will exploit it. WotC will print this card.

On Astrolabe specifically: there is no tier deck which wins/shapes the meta by playing Astrolabe without Oko. This isn't a thing that competes in legacy.

Astrolabe is not only the wrong ban (it's 100% Oko ban), it's a meaningless ban.

[FTW]

But Legacy has already been designated as the format to play broken blue mistakes they don't want in other formats (Brainstorm, Jace, the Mind Sculptor when first printed, True-Name Nemesis when first printed, Cruise and DTT longer than they lasted in other formats). Will they ban Oko, or just keep it dumped in Legacy for players who pimped out Elk tokens?

[tsabo_tavoc]

Which one is more oppressive:
Astrolabe + Oko + Uro
Top + Counterbalance + Terminus
Insectile Aberration + Wasteland + Stifle

Remember Legacy has 20/20, 10drils, and Griselbrand.

[Fox]

Which one is more oppressive:
Astrolabe + Oko + Uro
Top + Counterbalance + Terminus
Insectile Aberration + Wasteland + Stifle

Remember Legacy has 20/20, 10drils, and Griselbrand.

Counterbalance, not even close. Total hand destruction (countering everything you cast is another form of discard) is, by many degrees of magnitude, the most overpowered and illegitimate tactic in legacy.

[tsabo_tavoc]

Counterbalance, not even close. Total hand destruction (countering everything you cast is another form of discard) is, by many degrees of magnitude, the most overpowered and illegitimate tactic in legacy.

Actually not sure how Counterbalance fairs against the 3cc goodies. I remember far more cries on Top, and they did not touch it until the sign at their parking lot.

[Fox]

Right, there are cards that invalidate the ability to cheese total hand destruction. They are rare, and usually banned. The list includes: SDT, DTT, Wrenn, Breach, Lurrus, Oko (which allows inflated Veil use).

The hand destruction cheese never went away; it's just dormant until the last domino falls (Oko).

While Oko is the right ban, the format would get worse as you hand it right back to Hymn and Counterbalance exploiters.

[PirateKing]

nah, Allosaurus Shepard into Veil of Summer, pinnacle of health!

[pettdan]

Right, there are cards that invalidate the ability to cheese total hand destruction. They are rare, and usually banned. The list includes: SDT, DTT, Wrenn, Breach, Lurrus, Oko (which allows inflated Veil use).

The hand destruction cheese never went away; it's just dormant until the last domino falls (Oko).

While Oko is the right ban, the format would get worse as you hand it right back to Hymn and Counterbalance exploiters.

Oko doesn't stop people from playing Hymns, Veil does. It's why I've enjoyed having Veil in the format so much, there is a card that even non-blue decks can use to successfully interact with the 2-for-one attrition decks (Czech Pile / Grixis Control) other than Daze and Life from the Loam (probably forgetting some card). Counterbalance should have been banned over top in my view, being the most unfun card in the format by far (while at the time fuelling an oppressive archetype), but that's an old topic (and I guess rather subjective view).

If Oko is banned, we see Chalice being more useful and Vial + equipment, so Moon Stompy and DnT are back widening the pie of viable strategies, and hopefully we see Snoko split back into Miracles and Grixis Control but I think Astrolabe needs a ban too for that to happen.. Which it probably would next after Oko is banned, once RUG leaves the top of the meta with 5c control taking its place.

[FTW]

Oko doesn't stop people from playing Hymns, Veil does. It's why I've enjoyed having Veil in the format so much, there is a card that even non-blue decks can use to successfully interact with the 2-for-one attrition decks (Czech Pile / Grixis Control) other than Daze and Life from the Loam (probably forgetting some card). Counterbalance should have been banned over top in my view, being the most unfun card in the format by far (while at the time fuelling an oppressive archetype), but that's an old topic (and I guess rather subjective view).

Arguably, Oko makes blue decks want to splash green, which then lets them also play Veil. Without Oko there's less reason to be green vs UWr or Grixis.

[Fox]

Arguably, Oko makes blue decks want to splash green, which then lets them also play Veil. Without Oko there's less reason to be green vs UWr or Grixis.

This is the correct assessment of Oko inflating other card use; applicable to Uro, Veil, and Astrolabe.

The next assessment is that hitting any of those cards, not called Oko, with a ban would result in a direct boost to RUG Delver's winrate.

[pettdan]

Arguably, Oko makes blue decks want to splash green, which then lets them also play Veil. Without Oko there's less reason to be green vs UWr or Grixis.


This is the correct assessment of Oko inflating other card use; applicable to Uro, Veil, and Astrolabe.

I think I disagree with this. This is only (dangerous word) potentially true for the 5c control deck(s) and they would play Veil anyway as long as they have Astrolabe. For any green deck Veil is a natural inclusion in the 75 as long as there is a popular Hymn to Tourach deck (also some other cards, but let's continue the HTT aspect of the discussion, perhaps), and also for the 5c Astrolabe decks with or without Oko (it seems likely), which there won't be (a popular HTT deck) as long as those decks can run Veils. I don't think Oko plays a relevant role in this.. ecosystem of cards.

Astrolabe brings too much value for the control decks, I think. Letting them pick the best cards out of 5 colors while running blood moon and having wasteland protection. I don't see them giving up on this just because Oko left. At least not necessarily.

[Fox]

It's really hard to kill PWs when your deck has 4x Astrolabe that can't turn into haste 3/3s - you start to lack slots that answer this problem. This is why Astrolabe without Oko isn't a tier deck strategy - it's not good enough to compete in legacy.

The list of playable PWs that can be played against Oko/Astrolabe [without playing Oko] profitably is: Nissa of the 5/5s, Karn, Ugin (both of them), 6cmc Chandra, and 5cmc Teferi. This list explodes without hasted AstroElk.

[pettdan]

It's really hard to kill PWs when your deck has 4x Astrolabe that can't turn into haste 3/3s - you start to lack slots that answer this problem. This is why Astrolabe without Oko isn't a tier deck strategy - it's not good enough to compete in legacy.

The list of playable PWs that can be played against Oko/Astrolabe [without playing Oko] profitably is: Nissa of the 5/5s, Karn, Ugin (both of them), 6cmc Chandra, and 5cmc Teferi. This list explodes without hasted AstroElk.

I'm getting lost here, why are you discussing why a deck would choose to not play Oko even if it could? I don't see how this is relevant in any topic discussed recently..

[Fox]

I'm getting lost here, why are you discussing why a deck would choose to not play Oko even if it could? I don't see how this is relevant in any topic discussed recently..

You are saying Astrolabe is a meaningful card in legacy, but it actually isn't by itself. If it was, we would see any tier deck at all with an Astrolabe playset and no Oko. This deck does not exist b/c it isn't a thing that competes. The mechanism by which it does not compete is that Astrolabe must double as a PW killer to compete in this format (if it doesn't do this, such a deck dies to any PW ever).

[pettdan]

You are saying Astrolabe is a meaningful card in legacy, but it actually isn't by itself. If it was, we would see any tier deck at all with an Astrolabe playset and no Oko.

Can't agree with that. You won't know until Oko is gone if Astrolabe is playable without Oko. Why would someone ankleshoot themselves and not play Oko when they can, that's irrelevant as a measure of the value of Astrolabe. And I just explained why I think it is playable without Oko.

[Fox]

Can't agree with that. You won't know until Oko is gone if Astrolabe is playable without Oko. And I just explained why I think it is playable without Oko.

That Astrolabe is tier-playable by itself is pure conjecture. That Astrolabe (or any future 1cmc cantrip without sacrifice trinket) doubles as free PW kills with Oko is demonstrable. The correct ban is the demonstrable problem (Oko).

While Astrolabe *might* be tier-playable by itself, there is no evidence that a ban targeting Astrolabe would be necessary to control your supposed deck.

Anyone who thinks Astrolabe is the ban has missed many fundamental steps.

[FTW]

I think I disagree with this. This is only (dangerous word) potentially true for the 5c control deck(s) and they would play Veil anyway as long as they have Astrolabe. For any green deck Veil is a natural inclusion in the 75

Of course. But what is the justification to be a UG deck at all? Since DRS was banned, green did not offer much to blue decks. RUG Delver was less popular than Grixis Delver. Waterfalls was a meme deck. The dominant control decks were Miracles (UWx) and Grixis Control. There was little reason to BE a green deck at all vs playing a different blue deck.

W6 did, but then it was banned. Oko gave blue decks a reason to be green again. The UWx control shell wants to have green, becoming 4c or 5c. RUG Delver is now better than Grixis Delver, because of Oko. Oko is the reason for green in blue decks. Then, once your deck generates green mana, Veil is a natural inclusion. You do not include Veil in the 75 if your deck does not generate green mana. Oko is why blue decks want to generate green mana. That was my point.

If Oko is banned, will RUG Delver still be the best Delver? I doubt it. Will control still want green? Maybe only because Astrolabe enables 5c at low cost, but there will be much less pull into green.

[pettdan]

That Astrolabe is tier-playable by itself is pure conjecture. That Astrolabe (or any future 1cmc cantrip without sacrifice trinket) doubles as free PW kills with Oko is demonstrable. The correct ban is the demonstrable problem (Oko).

While Astrolabe *might* be tier-playable by itself, there is no evidence that a ban targeting Astrolabe would be necessary to control your supposed deck.

Anyone who thinks Astrolabe is the ban has missed many fundamental steps.

You seem to have missed that I too want Oko banned. I never argued that Oko shouldn't be banned.

Edit: I think Astrolabe needs to go, for reasons mentioned above, but I think Oko was always the real problem on a higher level, invalidating too many permanent-based strategies. Astrolabe merely lets control decks merge into 5c control.

[pettdan]

Of course. But what is the justification to be a UG deck at all?

You're looking at it too narrowly, I explained a few posts back the advantages of Astrolabe for a 5c deck. I mean, if a control deck can get away with cherry-picking the best cards regardless of color and still run blood moon, why wouldn't they? Their ability to do this doesn't seem to depend on Oko. But naturally, if there's no good card in a color then I suppose they cut that color.. It's just that there's very little cost for being greedy and running a 5c list.

[ShadWills]

I don't see GGGG uncounterable hexproof threats fixing that. It might give aggro a better edge against blue without blue getting to splash it, it might beat Oko, but as long as it's soft to combo Delver still straddles that line better. Unless it can interact with combo (to have game against the whole field, like Delver does), it would need to completely blow out blue matches 80-20 to the point where blue isn't the best aggro anymore.

Maybe...
Catsectile Apurration - G - Creature - Cat Warrior
Reach. Can't be countered.
Cumulative upkeep: Each player loses 2 life for each Island he or she controls
2/4

Whoa. I'm late to this conversation having just stumbled onto this so called "containment thread." But I find it intriguing. If you go back and look at the "Questing Thrun not of Legends" mentioned before, it is so obvious that that card is overpowered. Yet I agree that it probably would not be enough to unseat Delver and would be a worse card.

And, this Catsectile Apurration is... a very unexplored design space.

[ShadWills]

I think Oko was printed with the intent of boosting aggro (zoo) type strategies. Or, at least, with the idea that it cripples zoo strategies not-at-all. If the premier (most ban-calling at least) answer turns everything into Watchwolf, then, you know, the answer is just, play zoo. But I don't think it is enough incentive to do so.

I appreciate (Oko's place in) the incentive to make (non-blue) aggro good again; but maybe printing a premier blue answer to the format doesn't work that way.

[Fox]

How exactly does a maindeck lifegain/elk generator being played by not-zoo help zoo win. Rogue Elephant-type cards are synonymous with zoo, and Oko + Astrolabe makes hasted Rogue Elephants. Oko renders zoo unplayable??

[ShadWills]

I totally agree and that's kind of my point. On one axis, just turning everything into a 3/3 is 'not' an answer to a deck full of cheap creatures smaller than 3/3 who only turn sideways. So, on that axis there might be a presumption somewhere (in development?) that a card like that helps zoo by fighting everything but zoo. But in practice I don't think it has played out that way.

Edit: also, zoo was unplayable before Oko of course. I mean, Maverick is like, the current version of zoo. The difference is that true zoo attacked on the straight up "aggro" axis while Maverick works because of the "hate" axis. I'm interested in seeing true aggro make a resurgence but I'm not sure it's actually possible/reasonable.

[Zoid]

Given most recent card designs and bannings, I would severely question is any though at all has been put into Oko at all, yet one relating to eternal which they don't care about at all.

The problem of aggro never has been control anyway.
Aggro almost always loses to any deck that opens with Dark Ritual or takes a storm count for other reasons.
You will lose G1 so you have to win both post board games.
Then you have to hope to have enough hate to prevent them from winning too fast while not gimping yourself too hard.
Most effective hate bears start at 2 cmc which is also to late for G3 if you manage to win G2.

In an eternal format this is bound to happen at some point because one better new card for combo is much more relevant than one more good card for aggro.
Probably the first nail in the coffin was Ad Nauseam which technically gave you a chance to bolt people to death in response.
I would assume the last straw was Past in Flames which gives so much consistency to storm that there is no point to try disrupting.

Unless you introduce a metric like in modern for combo decks, which would lead to the banning of probably 5+ cards, aggro will stay dead in legacy forever.

[Admiral_Arzar]

The problem of aggro never has been control anyway.
Aggro almost always loses to any deck that opens with Dark Ritual or takes a storm count for other reasons.
You will lose G1 so you have to win both post board games.
Then you have to hope to have enough hate to prevent them from winning too fast while not gimping yourself too hard.
Most effective hate bears start at 2 cmc which is also to late for G3 if you manage to win G2.

In an eternal format this is bound to happen at some point because one better new card for combo is much more relevant than one more good card for aggro.
Probably the first nail in the coffin was Ad Nauseam which technically gave you a chance to bolt people to death in response.
I would assume the last straw was Past in Flames which gives so much consistency to storm that there is no point to try disrupting.

Unless you introduce a metric like in modern for combo decks, which would lead to the banning of probably 5+ cards, aggro will stay dead in legacy forever.

This is flagrantly inaccurate. Go back ten years or so, and you'd find Zoo, Goblins, Merfolk, and at times even Affinity as decks to beat, alongside Storm and Reanimator. This was even true during the Mystical Tutor period where those two combo decks were supercharged. Heck, I was undefeated against Storm (piloting Zoo) for years since the deck was fast and you could pack serious sideboard hate. Aggro losing to combo didn't matter all that much because your matchup against everything else was excellent (and both Storm and graveyard decks can be battled with several strong sideboard bullets). People forget that there was a time where there was no Terminus, no Batterskull, no Scapcaster Mage. Aggro ran over most fair blue decks, to the extent where you'd see cards like Rhox War Monk in the maindeck of blue midrange decks. Tarmogoyf was everywhere partially because it was such a good blocker against aggro.

All that started to change for two factors. One was combo related - but it wasn't related to Storm or graveyard decks. The rise of a third combo pillar (Show and Tell) made it pretty difficult to sideboard enough hate to cover the relevant combo matchups. This didn't become a huge issue until Griselbrand, which doubled as an oversized Baneslayer against decks trying to win by attacking. Show and Tell was also much harder to hate out via sideboard bullets (Containment Priest wouldn't be printed for a while) and most of the hate didn't overlap with hate for the other two decks. However, the primary factor that led to aggro's demise was the power creep of fair blue decks. Batterskull and Snapcaster Mage made blue midrange a bad matchup for most aggro decks. The printing of Terminus and True-Name Nemesis a few sets later put the nails in the coffin. As if that wasn't enough, the printing of Delver of Secrets made tempo nearly as aggressive as aggro (Delver >> Wild Nacatl). Power-creeped tempo *replaced* aggro at the same time that power-creeped blue midrange and control made it unplayable.

To address the Past in Flames example - I don't think it really mattered. Ill-Gotten Gains is just as good against decks without stack interaction. It might even be better, considering it makes your mana easier. I do agree with the last part - but I think we're probably thinking of different cards. Aggro coming back would require the complete knee-capping of the busted blue midrange shell, and I think it would be more than five cards. Delver, Snapcaster, Terminus, TNN and Oko at the very least would have to go. Taking out Show and Tell as a strategy might also be necessary. In the meantime, if you want to turn dudes sideways your choices are basically (a) Delver and (b) Chalice.

[Grizzlenasty]

In the meantime, if you want to turn dudes sideways your choices are basically (a) Delver and (b) Chalice.

I'm pretty much with you on everything you wrote. Combo isn't really the problem. Maybe the high Meta percentage of it but not combo in itself. What killed most aggro strategies is, that the once "Bread and Butter" strategies to face with true aggro either all have become way to efficient, or are doing the same thing as aggro while also supporting cantrip cartel and FoWs. Namely Delver.
But I think there is more to be successfully turned sideways then delver and chalice. So I'd like to add c)Thalias and d) Gobbos and Elves.

Rhox War Monk is my fav card of all time.. pitches to Force and Natural Order and stopped Nacatls, Apes and Bolts for days. What not to love about that one.

[Ronald Deuce]

This isn't intended to take things off track, and I've trumpeted my views on Chalice plenty of times, but I had a discussion recently that I thought was fruitful and interesting, so I thought I'd pose a question.

Is "not being able to play one-drops" (be that true or false) really a weakness for Chalice decks when you can run eight to twelve Sol lands? If so, is it not outweighed by the advantage of getting double the mana most other decks/manabases yield over time?

This might not be the best place to discuss this, so I'm happy to take this discussion elsewhere if this isn't the venue.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

This isn't intended to take things off track, and I've trumpeted my views on Chalice plenty of times, but I had a discussion recently that I thought was fruitful and interesting, so I thought I'd pose a question.

Is "not being able to play one-drops" (be that true or false) really a weakness for Chalice decks when you can run eight to twelve Sol lands? If so, is it not outweighed by the advantage of getting double the mana most other decks/manabases yield over time?

This might not be the best place to discuss this, so I'm happy to take this discussion elsewhere if this isn't the venue.

Yes, and if you're in any of the post servers there's serious discussions about Keys (manifold voltalic, and candelabra) which would otherwise be auto includes in decks where they're effectively sol rings, and Manavaults.
Some, myself included, do it anyways and just accept as a way of life that sometimes you're going to strand your own one-drops.

[non-inflammable]

I don't play chalice because i want to, i play chalice to stop the cantrip cartel.

ban brainstorm and chalice will go away...

[Secretly.A.Bee]

I don't play chalice because i want to, i play chalice to stop the cantrip cartel.

ban brainstorm and chalice will go away...I think that unless you ban ponder also, this simply won't be true, and even then there is value in Chalice @ 1 from nonblue decks - vials, lackeys, bolts, moms, storm, remember preordain will then be played - Chalice would drop in price and see a downtick, but I can't see it going away.

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk

[pettdan]

Is "not being able to play one-drops" (be that true or false) really a weakness for Chalice decks when you can run eight to twelve Sol lands? If so, is it not outweighed by the advantage of getting double the mana most other decks/manabases yield over time?


Yes, and if you're in any of the post servers there's serious discussions about Keys (manifold voltalic, and candelabra) which would otherwise be auto includes in decks where they're effectively sol rings, and Manavaults.
Some, myself included, do it anyways and just accept as a way of life that sometimes you're going to strand your own one-drops.

Turbo Forge runs (well, ran, it's not seeing much play now) 4-5 maindeck keys alongside the chalices, very successfully.

Personally, my experience is that whenever I play a blue sol land + chalice deck, I draw the conclusion that it would be much better with brainstorms over chalices. That deck has often been Tezzerator, and most decks can ignore and win through a chalice, probably they can also answer it in play and many can answer it on the stack. Chalice is a card that promotes deck diversity and deck building diversity, I personally always found Counterbalance to be its evil sibling since very few cards can answer it, it can stop any of your cards, and it brings a feeling of "I'm probably going to lose this but I don't know so I have to play it out" and every countered spell is such a disappointment. And it is, opposite to chalice, one-sided. If it affected both players then ok, but it's a one-sided chalice on variable numbers. It furthermore got Top banned, one can argue, although time-management was a thing too.

Edit:
The above was mostly about the trade-off between one-drops and chalice. To answer your question though, Ronald Deuce, is the mana advantage outweighing the deck-building restrictions for chalice? Eldrazi seems to be doing fairly well, the monsters are good enough vs the Oko decks and the chalice + TKS are good enough vs the combo decks, or that's what I think the deck's popularity indicates. While the Moon Stompy deck lacks the pressure that Eldrazi has, for beating control and fair decks in general, while the moons don't quite seem to cut it as a lock piece, not enough to make the deck chosen by a significant amount of players. Both the deck's lock pieces, the moon and the chalice, are handled by current control decks. So, it would seem that the answer to your question is that the mana acceleration from sol lands compensates for the deck building restriction from chalice IF you're using the mana to ramp out monsters but not if you're using it to play blood moons.

If we leave the topic a little bit and consider Imperial Painter, which has been running well in MTGO leagues (this is a bit anecdotal as I haven't seen it top any events, but Daize and Zaracias have been doing really well with it, I think, while streaming in the Painter Discord), it neglects to play the chalice in favor of redblasts and grindstone. I think the careful observation from that is that running redblasts is better than running chalice, and that's because it lines up better against the preferred threats in the format than chalice, threats being (among others) Oko, Show and Tell and Thassa's Oracle. Chalice is certainly good, but I think redblast is a little better. At least if you're coupling it with blood moons.. It's a complicated discussion but making sense of it seems to require that you consider how your threats and answers line up vs Oko and Astrolabe rather than some internal synergy aspect of the deck. Maybe some other cards should be considered current format defining cards too, I make it simple for myself by just considering the cards that seem to be most influential vs the decks that I play (or well, rather, I don't have time to go through everything), but probably Dreadhorde Arcanist, Force of Negation and Uro should be considered too. They define what your deck needs to line up favorably against if your deck wants to be relevant in the competition.

So, I think if the above discussion is meaningful, then that indicates that the question of what works isn't really about the deck building restrictions coming from chalice, it's about if the cards you are accelerating into line up well against the fair decks.

Edit2: sorry for the long post, didn't have time to shorten it today, unfortunately. I'll make the relevant sentences stand out with bold text.

[Mr. Safety]

So, is legacy pretty stable right now? I can't think of anything that needs a banning. Annoying cards for sure (Oko, Astrolabe, Uro, Veil of Summer, the usual bullshit) but nothing ban-worthy. It looks like we might actually get a set (Zendikar Rising) without rotating the format, too.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

So, is legacy pretty stable right now? I can't think of anything that needs a banning. Annoying cards for sure (Oko, Astrolabe, Uro, Veil of Summer, the usual bullshit) but nothing ban-worthy. It looks like we might actually get a set (Zendikar Rising) without rotating the format, too.

Literally half of what you mentioned is ban worthy.

[Mr. Safety]

Literally half of what you mentioned is ban worthy.

Meh, I don't think so. I highly doubt any of those get a ban other than maybe Oko due to it being banned in several other formats. The others are good, but not too good. I don't see Astrolabe getting much play if Oko gets banned. I stand by my point that those cards are annoying, but not ban-worthy.

[KobeBryan]

Literally half of what you mentioned is ban worthy.

maybe oko. the rest are ok.

[BKclassic]

maybe oko. the rest are ok.

I guess this issue has been hashed out a thousand times, but I don't see how Oko is a bigger offender than Astrolabe. Oko is easy enough to Red Blast. As long as Astrolabe is legal, 5c Snowpile with the latest and greatest broken value cards is going to be a permanent fixture of the format. I guess I just think it's dumb that a blue-white deck playing mostly basics gets to splash Abrupt Decay. Unlike, Sensei's Diving Top and Deathrite Shaman which were easy enough to shut off with Pithing Needle, Astrolabe is very difficult card to punish someone for playing. The only vulnerability is loss of tempo, but Astrolabe players get to make up for this by playing an unassailable mana-base and all the best answers regardless of color.

[Fox]

The thing that people don't seem to get is that Oko is a Flametongue Kavu vs pretty much any other existing source of recurring value source which sits on the battlefield, particularly other PWs. Any 1-drop trinket that cantrips without going to the graveyard makes the previous statement all the more true - Oko gets to turbo down enemy PWs without any fear of summoning sickness coming into the equation. The card doing the job of Council's Judgement is now a 1-card combo that takes over the game; a barely watered-down highly undercosted 3 mana Apex Predator.

Gotta stop mentioning cards that aren't anywhere near Oko's league. Ban Astro = really, we need to buff RUG Delver do we? Ban Veil = ban yet another card to protect Hymn to Tourach [Cruise, Dig, SDT, Breach, Lurrus, Wrenn]? Ban Uro/Dreadhorde = maybe don't ban DRS next time?

[BKclassic]

The thing that people don't seem to get is that Oko is a Flametongue Kavu vs pretty much any other existing source of recurring value source which sits on the battlefield, particularly other PWs. Any 1-drop trinket that cantrips without going to the graveyard makes the previous statement all the more true - Oko gets to turbo down enemy PWs without any fear of summoning sickness coming into the equation. The card doing the job of Council's Judgement is now a 1-card combo that takes over the game; a barely watered-down highly undercosted 3 mana Apex Predator.

Gotta stop mentioning cards that aren't anywhere near Oko's league. Ban Astro = really, we need to buff RUG Delver do we? Ban Veil = ban yet another card to protect Hymn to Tourach [Cruise, Dig, SDT, Breach, Lurrus, Wrenn]? Ban Uro/Dreadhorde = maybe don't ban DRS next time?

You raise a good point that RUG is going to dominate if Astrolabe is banned. However, RUG is fairly narrow strategy with exploitable weaknesses (non-basic mana base, removal, Carpet of Flowers). I am a RUG Delver player so maybe I'm biased about the desirability of that outcome. I do agree that poor ban list management is a major contributing factor. I would definitely be interested in at least trying a metagame with DRS and Top unbanned. It's at least hard to imagine the same deck playing DRS, Top AND Astrolabe so there might be some different flavors of control there.

[Zoid]

Yes, let's have both astrolabe and DRS in the format.
Who needs mana management anyway.
The one biggest factors to the reduction of diversity in the format is not only the printing of stupid cards, but the minimal opportunity costs for splashing stuff.

Until they print playable 1 mana removal that can also hit PWs, Oko should be banned.
3 mana and potentially 6 starting loyalty binds too many resources getting rid of him if he doesn't take over the game completely anyway.

Veil of Summer is going to be banned at some point because it does both, the thing it's supposed to and the opposite.
It's fine to try to give green/creature based strategies a tool to combat control but they forgot to make it only creature spells that are uncounterable.
Even though that is still crowbar design, it's better than a card that can also be used to protect combo from almost any kind of interaction.

[Stevestamopz]

I tend to agree that Oko is the main problem, just because it's able to answer onboard answers to it, like for instance Tombstalker (not that anyone else plays it) or a big Knight on an empty board. With that said, even if Oko was banned this weekend would that make the format appealing again?

- Astrolabe & Vista letting people play 4-5 colour decks with Back to Basics is kinda dumb but not the end of the world;
- Uro/Arcanist create snowball games (and when Uro stabilises it tends to just take over games all by itself) but again, not the end of the world by themselves;
- Plague Engineer punishes those stupid enough to *checks notes* play a tier 2 Tribal deck;
- Veil of Summer is supposed to help out non-blue fair decks like Jund or adjacent type decks but I don't even know what non-blue decks are playing it. I know TES did well recently playing 4 maindeck though and that my most favourite deck of all time, Sneak and Show is also splashing green for it (among other things also mentioned on this list). Turning off discard as an angle of attack hurts the decks without Force of Will more, no?

The problem IMO is not limited to just one card or even two. In a vacuum none of these cards are really all that annoying but put together they make legacy kinda tiresome.

I don't even know how one would fix the format at this point to make it more enjoyable, if that could even be measured to everyone's standards - there are just so many cards that can make one's magic experience miserable, starting at Delver and Griselbrand and ending at whatever was most recently printed, and by that I mean cards that absolutely *have* to be answered or just either kill you on the spot (Dark Depths) or effectively win the game most of the time once they land (Oko/Uro/Dreadhorde).

I only post the above to ask this question: does anyone else feel this way?

[Zoid]

The problem IMO is not limited to just one card or even two. In a vacuum none of these cards are really all that annoying but put together they make legacy kinda tiresome.

I only post the above to ask this question: does anyone else feel this way?

Welcome to any format in the last years.
At this point, there is so much degenerate garbage around, even if you ban something, the next slightly less/different degenerate card is there to take it's place.

For legacy, I really think banning all fetches would make the format vastly more enjoyable.
Brainstorm would be shit.
Mana bases would be a lot more vulnerable and you couldn't just easily play 15_color_goodstuff.dec.
Strategies that rely on a filled GY would also be a lot weaker.

As long as the reserved list still stands, this is highly unlikely/undesirable, as the prices would get even more astronomical.
This is also likely the reason stuff from the reserved list like Earthcraft, Yawgmoth's Bargain, and Wheel of Fortune are still banned.
Unbanned it would either be garbage and meaningless or playable, expensive and format warping so there is little to be gained.

[pettdan]

The problem IMO is not limited to just one card or even two. In a vacuum none of these cards are really all that annoying but put together they make legacy kinda tiresome.

I don't even know how one would fix the format at this point to make it more enjoyable, if that could even be measured to everyone's standards - there are just so many cards that can make one's magic experience miserable, starting at Delver and Griselbrand and ending at whatever was most recently printed, and by that I mean cards that absolutely *have* to be answered or just either kill you on the spot (Dark Depths) or effectively win the game most of the time once they land (Oko/Uro/Dreadhorde).

I only post the above to ask this question: does anyone else feel this way?

I do mostly agree and post my view more or less regularly so sorry if it's repetition. I think Legacy would be more enjoyable, more varied and less snowbally without these cards, promoting interaction and more interesting games. But, I think it's risky getting rid of cards like Griselbrand that have a lot of archetypes and players depending on them, it's always a risk when banning cards that you get disappointed players who invested time and resources into a deck.

As for the other cards, I think it's important to separate between cards that are bad and cards that are really bad for format diversity. W6 was really bad, and so is Oko, imo. Cards that make archetypes obsolete are not welcome, imo. Plague Engineer does have some such effect but much less powerful, again imo, like Elves is still a very successful deck even if PE is heavily played, Thalia and Mother of runes are losing a lot of play which is partly due to PE but probably more due to Oko (or equally, I think equipment being bad is worse for those decks than losing a few x/1 humans). I think the format benefits from PE leaving but we can still have a good format with it around, while Oko is on the wrong side of that border. I think Arcanist and to a lesser extent Uro don't make the format or gameplay more interesting but they can both be handled rather easily. If Oko wasn't around then Chalice would easily neutralize Arcanist, similarly if Astrolabe didn't exist then Uro would not be a problem since Wasteland would limit its use. Which illustrates that the problem is with Oko and Astrolabe primarily. I even think that without Oko and Astrolabe, Uro can be spawning a unique archetype which actually benefits the format.

Astrolabe seemingly enabling 5c goodstuff is why we can't have it around, imo.

And again, Veil is frustrating to play against but it's a worse card than Pyroblast and it perfectly balances Hymn to Tourach decks like no ther card can. I think the format benefits from it, it adds an interesting layer in the deck building decisions about whether you run discard or counterspells or permanents to interact with your opponent, it's a net positive for format diversity and health buuut it's frustrating to play against.

[Mr. Safety]

Welcome to any format in the last years.
At this point, there is so much degenerate garbage around, even if you ban something, the next slightly less/different degenerate card is there to take it's place.

We've been aware of Legacy's slow journey towards the same place as Vintage for years: you play broken shit, usually a combo, alongside the best possible cards in the format. I don't mean to misrepresent Vintage, but one thing I do know is that there are fewer competitive decks available in that format compared to Legacy. The older the format gets, the more powerful the cards get, the closer you get to Vintage templating. When Zoo became unplayable and the best aggressive deck became Delver I knew we were on that path. Without Bazaar we won't have op-Dredge and without Workshop we won't have op-Prison. So what's left? Blue-based decks that can play the exact cards needed to fight the format with any splash color they need, up to 4-5 colors if they want. So we don't have moxen, and instead we have Astrolabe. Games are going to get swingier as compact combos replace traditional threats. (Oko, Uro, Arcanist.)

I've been thinking about this for a while, ever since The Rock and Jund became essentially unplayable because the best GBx shell is Dark Depths. Notice a correlation? I'm not saying those decks can't steal a tournament, but they are vastly less powerful than the combo-spectrum of Dark Depths. Zoo is replaced by Delver, Rock is replaced by Dark Depths, control variants become 3-4 color monstrosities because they can.

Maybe I'm way off, but this is how I see the format. I see people wanting to have it the same as what everyone wanted Modern to be: a format where anything is playable. Modern went through the transition from open-ended to only-busted-decks way faster than Legacy will, simply due to the lack of format police (Wasteland, Daze, Force of Will.) However, I still see Legacy getting there eventually.

[pettdan]

We've been aware of Legacy's slow journey towards the same place as Vintage for years: you play broken shit, usually a combo, alongside the best possible cards in the format. [...] The older the format gets, the more powerful the cards get, the closer you get to Vintage templating.

So, if I got it right, your understanding of the format is basically the older it gets, the better cards exist, the more degenerate it is. I think we can quickly understand that this is not what's happening. If it was, then Legacy would always be more degenerate than Modern, but we all know that Legacy has been much more healthy and varied than Modern at many points of time over the past years. My understanding of format health has been that it's the balance of the power of the best cards (including answers, removal etc, but that's a separate discussion) that influence the format health, so in my previous post I argue that Oko is overpowered relative to other cards that fair decks use, it's not an inherent property of the age of the format or card or the amount of cards available in the format but rather it is a problem because of the power of Oko relative to other legal cards and banning this single card will level out the playing field again.

Another observation contradicting this view of aging formats becoming degenerate, Legacy was by several people considered to be perhaps more healthy than ever before just before War of the Spark was released, at least I read several people state this at the time. A format can clearly improve.

Another observation is that it was actually a rules change about legendary permanents that made Depths replace The Rock, so it was actually the rules change that increased the power level of an old card rather than a new printing. So, I guess that makes it an exception.

[mistercakes]

it really depends on how people want to innovate with the format. there are definitely some strong cards and you can even say optimal cards for each given archetype. it is possible that many synergies have been overlooked.

until the average skill level of legacy players is very high, you can play more or less whatever you want if you know what you're doing. it's possible that the modo metagame is a bit more hostile for this kind of approach to the game, but i can speak from experience for tabletop that i play whatever deck i want and my records are pretty consistent regardless of deck choice.

[Wrath of Pie]

There is no incentive to break Legacy, otherwise the degeneracy would be more obvious (although probably not to the extreme Modern has been historically).

[Cire]

I think banning all fetches and Astrolab (AKA getting rid of perfect multicolored manabases and making BS weaker) and then unbanning DRS (weaker without fetches and providing some decent MD gravehate) would make the format interesting :rolleyes:

[KobeBryan]

I think banning all fetches and Astrolab (AKA getting rid of perfect multicolored manabases and making BS weaker) and then unbanning DRS (weaker without fetches and providing some decent MD gravehate) would make the format interesting :rolleyes:


Or ban brainstorm right

[Cire]

Or ban brainstorm right

Eh - I recognize that it is a Sacred Cow of the Format.

[Mr. Safety]

So, if I got it right, your understanding of the format is basically the older it gets, the better cards exist, the more degenerate it is. I think we can quickly understand that this is not what's happening.

I didn't write degenerate at all, look at the Zoo vs. Delver comparison. What I'm saying is that the format is narrowing, ie the more powerful the cards are that get printed the more cards get pushed out of the format. Delver isn't degenerate (discussion for another time) but it obsoleted Wild Nacatl handily. That's the argument I'm making.

I also said this:


Modern went through the transition from open-ended to only-busted-decks way faster than Legacy will, simply due to the lack of format police (Wasteland, Daze, Force of Will.) However, I still see Legacy getting there eventually.

Modern got there quicker due to a lack of widely played, powerful 'policing' cards.


If it was, then Legacy would always be more degenerate than Modern, but we all know that Legacy has been much more healthy and varied than Modern at many points of time over the past years.

I didn't mention degenerate in my statement, you're introducing that as a definition. I didn't say degenerate, I said 'busted'. Both are vague terms, so let me define my perspective: busted means it's a tier zero deck, basically the best thing to be doing in the format. Whether that means a ban should happen or not is open for another debate, something I'm not really addressing. I already stated if anything Oko is the one ban I would support. Looking at Oko it's even more compact than Tinker + Time Vault/Blightsteel Colossus, or Oath of Druids + Best Beefy Dude (I'm assuming it's Griselbrand, but again I don't want to misrepresent a format I don't play. If I'm full of shit I'm sure someone will correct me, which I welcome.)

My understanding of 'degenerate' is more akin to something like Underworld Breach, or in the old days Flash. Not only is it tier 0 but everyone is incentivized to either play it or play only strategies that beat it. Legacy is not at this point right now, which is why I don't advocate for a ban. I'm just saying the win conditions of Legacy are getting more compact, more efficient. Eventually they will push strategies out of the format, just like in Vintage.


My understanding of format health has been that it's the balance of the power of the best cards (including answers, removal etc, but that's a separate discussion) that influence the format health, so in my previous post I argue that Oko is overpowered relative to other cards that fair decks use, it's not an inherent property of the age of the format or card or the amount of cards available in the format but rather it is a problem because of the power of Oko relative to other legal cards and banning this single card will level out the playing field again.

New or old, Oko is a one-card combo of efficient answer + threat to most of the format. It is obviously pushing powerful cards out of the format, look at Jace the Mind Sculptor. I don't think it will be long before Jace is essentially unplayable, and it sees very little play now. Liliana of the Veil was once incredibly good, now is seen in only fringe decks like the occasional Pox or Jund. The format is narrowing. I'm not arguing about format health, that is much too subjective to ever nail down (just look at this thread's history.)


Another observation contradicting this view of aging formats becoming degenerate, Legacy was by several people considered to be perhaps more healthy than ever before just before War of the Spark was released, at least I read several people state this at the time. A format can clearly improve.

Again, not arguing about degeneracy, that was introduced by you. I can see the argument about pre-Spark Legacy, it even makes sense, but it's a different point.


Another observation is that it was actually a rules change about legendary permanents that made Depths replace The Rock, so it was actually the rules change that increased the power level of an old card rather than a new printing. So, I guess that makes it an exception.

It is true that a rules change made Depths better than Rock, but other factors in the format helped push the Rock out as well (and Jund.) Maybe I'm making a false comparison there, it just seems so clear to me that if you want to play BGx that the combo deck of Dark Depths is better than the mid-range Rock or Jund. This could possibly change, but I am skeptical. Rock/Jund were always tier 2 anyways, whereas Depths goes in/out of DTB regularly. I would also argue that cards like Assassin's Trophy and Veil of Summer are newer cards that make Depths even more powerful, whereas it's just a replacement effect in Rock/Jund. Protecting a 20/20 that wins on the spot is more powerful than protecting a Dark Confidant/Tarmogoyf/Liliana of the Veil.

I could also add that Storm is an example of the format narrowing. There is really only one competitive Storm deck right now, and that's TES, which has been completely re-tooled to use Veil of Summer instead of discard. There used to be ANT, Solidarity, and Doomsday for other storm variations.

I've really blown a lot of hot air here, but I think my point is clear: Legacy isn't getting more degenerate, it's getting narrower in competitive strategies. I believe it will eventually become like vintage where you're always playing the best cards in the format alongside your combo of choice.

[pettdan]

I didn't mention degenerate in my statement, you're introducing that as a definition. I didn't say degenerate, I said 'busted'.

So, in short, I don't think it's meaningful to treat 'busted' and 'degenerate' as different concepts here, we're talking about the same thing and it's mostly format depending anyway (I suppose one could refer to broken vintage cards as degenerate and broken legacy cards as busted), and using another synonym with a slightly different meaning doesn't change anything, in my view (both concepts are interchangeable for me in the context of this discussion, even if slightly different). Especially since I didn't define it differently, I was just referring to whatever you were talking about. My argument still applies, it's still a question of a card breaking the format by too high power level.. And you even agreed to that, so we seem to be on the same page somehow.

[FTW]

There's no point in banning fetches. They already created a format for that.

Legacy is the only format to play 4xBrainstorm + fetch into dual. It is perhaps the most defining feature of the format. Overpowered or not, it's what makes Legacy most distinct from other formats and retains the player base. Banning fetches or Brainstorm essentially creates a new format and invalidates the reason WOTC lets Legacy exist.

There is nothing wrong with having a Brainstorm format, until they do dumb things like make Maverick creatures in blue (Delver, TNN) and the best planeswalkers in blue. Brainstorm decks used to be more balanced before they gave blue all the best tools with little drawback for playing them.

[pettdan]

There is nothing wrong with having a Brainstorm format, until they do dumb things like make Maverick creatures in blue (Delver, TNN) and the best planeswalkers in blue. Brainstorm decks used to be more balanced before they gave blue all the best tools with little drawback for playing them.

I think Karn tGC helped colorless and artifact strategies compete with blue decks and hopefully they get around to creating other options for nonblue decks, ie powerful cards that aren't easily added to the blue shell. Allosaurus Shepherd seems to be helping Elves fight blue, actually, there could be more of that.

[FTW]

Could Shepherd even make green midrange viable? I think there is untapped potential.

Once cards like Primeval Titan, Collected Company, Green Sun's Zenith, Titania, Priest of Argoth all can't be countered, that must open up design space.

[PirateKing]

Allosaurus Shepherd seems to be helping Elves fight blue, actually, there could be more of that.

It was explained to me that Allosaurus Shepherd was a Chalice @ 1 answer first and foremost. When I asked about helping against counterspells, the reply was essentially, "oh those? yeah sure whatever those too"
Maybe non Elves lists can use them to stop blue magic but it didn't seem to be a major issue anyways to Elves players.
Now they talked about running Shepherd for Calice and Collector Ouphe as GSZ answer for all other artifacts, and end they days of being dead to running Chalices when a single naturalize effect is your only answer.

[Mr. Safety]

So, in short, I don't think it's meaningful to treat 'busted' and 'degenerate' as different concepts here, we're talking about the same thing and it's mostly format depending anyway (I suppose one could refer to broken vintage cards as degenerate and broken legacy cards as busted), and using another synonym with a slightly different meaning doesn't change anything, in my view (both concepts are interchangeable for me in the context of this discussion, even if slightly different). Especially since I didn't define it differently, I was just referring to whatever you were talking about. My argument still applies, it's still a question of a card breaking the format by too high power level.. And you even agreed to that, so we seem to be on the same page somehow.

I tentatively agree; I'm not sure Oko needs a ban, but of all the 'offenders', it seems the easiest for WOTC to justify based on it's being banned in other formats.

I'm arguing that new powerful cards push other cards out of the format, and unless we continually ban things (ie like Modern) the inevitable end is a Vintage-like format with only a few competitive decks. I don't advocate for bans, and WOTC is generally reticent to ban cards in Legacy, so this is my prediction. I don't usually buy into the 'slippery slope' argument, but in this case it's like a really long slippery slope to me.

Good discussion, I can agree to say busted is the same as degenerate. :smile:

[pettdan]

It was explained to me that Allosaurus Shepherd was a Chalice @ 1 answer first and foremost. When I asked about helping against counterspells, the reply was essentially, "oh those? yeah sure whatever those too"
Maybe non Elves lists can use them to stop blue magic but it didn't seem to be a major issue anyways to Elves players.
Now they talked about running Shepherd for Calice and Collector Ouphe as GSZ answer for all other artifacts, and end they days of being dead to running Chalices when a single naturalize effect is your only answer.

That's probably correct, I'm certainly not an expert on Elves and I can see Chalice being a big issue, but having glimpse and natural order uncounterable, both often leading directly to a win, seems like a huge advantage.


Could Shepherd even make green midrange viable? I think there is untapped potential.

Once cards like Primeval Titan, Collected Company, Green Sun's Zenith, Titania, Priest of Argoth all can't be countered, that must open up design space.

I must agree, there may be some untapped potential (lol) there. Shepherd + Natural order could be ran with mother/giver in a maverick deck for example, allowing it to get progenitus vs control decks or something else powerful.

[pettdan]

I'm arguing that new powerful cards push other cards out of the format, and unless we continually ban things (ie like Modern) the inevitable end is a Vintage-like format with only a few competitive decks. I don't advocate for bans, and WOTC is generally reticent to ban cards in Legacy, so this is my prediction. I don't usually buy into the 'slippery slope' argument, but in this case it's like a really long slippery slope to me.

In a way new powerful cards always replace weaker, old cards. But, if it strengthens a noncompetitive archetype then it's effectively increasing the amount of competitively playable cards. So, new powerful printings can also lead to a more varied metagame. If they keep printing more and more powerful cards, on a higher powerlevel, leaving old cards behind, then yeah, the format narrows around them. That's certainly a possibility too, can't disagree.

[phonics]

I tentatively agree; I'm not sure Oko needs a ban, but of all the 'offenders', it seems the easiest for WOTC to justify based on it's being banned in other formats.

I'm arguing that new powerful cards push other cards out of the format, and unless we continually ban things (ie like Modern) the inevitable end is a Vintage-like format with only a few competitive decks. I don't advocate for bans, and WOTC is generally reticent to ban cards in Legacy, so this is my prediction. I don't usually buy into the 'slippery slope' argument, but in this case it's like a really long slippery slope to me.

Good discussion, I can agree to say busted is the same as degenerate. :smile:


In a way new powerful cards always replace weaker, old cards. But, if it strengthens a noncompetitive archetype then it's effectively increasing the amount of competitively playable cards. So, new powerful printings can also lead to a more varied metagame. If they keep printing more and more powerful cards, on a higher powerlevel, leaving old cards behind, then yeah, the format narrows around them. That's certainly a possibility too, can't disagree.

I think non competitive archetypes are usually non competitive because they either lack the consistency or power, the problem lies in printing cards that address those issues that dont fit into the decks that are already more consistent (blue cantrip) or more powerful (chalice/ combo). Printing more powerful cards works, but even though power levels can increase indefinitely there are hard coded limits that they play around which causes the game to break when they go up against them, which they have with increasing frequency. It is like how burn as a strategy essentially has a hard ceiling on its power because it is designed around players having 20 life. Similarly, companion cards were broken because they essentially they gave people +1 cards (and more) in hand for little cost. When you push the power level as they have for the past decade they eventually reach a point where pushing it further just breaks things because they pass the limits of the games built in restrictions.

I think design in general is too far gone at this point because they messed up and in trying to fix design errors they have warped design around those mess ups which leaves them in the position where the only way out is power creep. Many pros have discussed this issue at length, where power creep in threats necessitates power creep in answers which disincentivizes risk (bombs) which then drives design towards threats that work through removal (etb/ death effects or other ways to get value even if they are answered) or are so busted that they are worth the risk because they swing the game immediately by a large margin. All of this narrows the playable design space further so in non eternal formats I think the only solution is depowering the format, but everyone hates that(see Masques after Urza's block) so design will never go in that direction, especially with how they have demonstrated they want growth over health the past few years.

Eternal formats are different because the cards never go away, so they can either ban problems or inflate them away via power creep which then causes its own problems as stated above. Things like giving blue access to good creatures and spells for limited cost is something you cant take back. You could give every other color blue-tier card selection and stack interaction, otherwise you are printing super powerful, narrow cards that fit into things like chalice or all in combo decks which feeds back into the power creep problem. I think most of their design has fallen into one of those three camps. Also printing stronger combo pieces inadvertently makes blue stronger as well since nothing else can interact on the stack to the same degree, or don't have the card selection to find sideboard cards as easily, pushing them out of the format. Simply creating new archetypes is also super difficult because they have to fit somewhere on the continuum between cantrip decks with superior card selection and combo/ chalice decks with superior power, a desolate area relegated to a couple midrange creature decks(vial/ elves) and tier 2+ meme decks people play for fun. They have to print really strong, non combo spells that gives midrange decks a reason not to run cantrips (or the blue package) or sol lands and chalice, which seems like a pretty big ask. Companions were a major missed opportunity because they were probably the first time a while where they could have printed something very strong with the restriction that the deck didn't have islands, or something in that vein to give other colors things that couldn't be easily co-opted by the cantrip shell. They are probably going to break the format many more times before they find a solution.

[Mr. Safety]

In a way new powerful cards always replace weaker, old cards. But, if it strengthens a noncompetitive archetype then it's effectively increasing the amount of competitively playable cards. So, new powerful printings can also lead to a more varied metagame. If they keep printing more and more powerful cards, on a higher powerlevel, leaving old cards behind, then yeah, the format narrows around them. That's certainly a possibility too, can't disagree.

That's my argument. I am saying we aren't just getting Fatal Push that replaces Ghastly Demise, we are getting Oko that replaces Jace, *and* True Name Nemesis. We're getting Uro that replaces Tarmogoyf *and* nimble mongoose. We are getting Veil of Summer that literally replaced Thoughtseize and Duress in TES (yes I know they play Defense Grid, too.) My examples aren't perfect, but I think you understand what I mean. We aren't getting upgrades, we're getting cards that obsolete multiple other cards.

We can 1) advocate for continual banning to keep this power creep from turning the format into Vintage 2.0, or 2) accept that Legacy will eventually become Vintage 2.0 and keep the banlist at a minimum.

Also, these are just my opinions as well. I'm open to being wrong, it's just how I see it. Wouldn't be the first, nor will it be the last, time I was completely wrong.

[Hanni]

Cards like Ancient Stirrings and Once Upon a Time seem like a great step in that direction, in addition to Allosaurus as already mentioned. Of course there is already GSZ, but there's other cards that can do this as well, such Faithless Looting and Light Up the Stage.

They can literally print entirely new archetypes like Eldrazi if they want to, and despite that specific example falling into the Chalice dynamic, they can also print other cards that don't. Tribal itself is a pretty easy area to do so, but they can print cards like Thespian's Stage that spawn new archetypes too. In that case it falls into combo, but they regularly print cards that are good in Vial decks like D&T, or other aggro decks like Maverick, etc.

Expecting aggro decks to not want Vial, mana dorks, or some other way to accelerate or cheat on mana just isn't feasible because they need to be able to keep up with the speed of the rest of the format.

Expecting decks to not want to build around combos when possible also isn't feasible, because the ability to assemble them within the card pool offers too much payoff for the cost/investment.

That doesn't mean that new archetypes can't pop up, but I agree that the generic archetype definitions have been mostly fleshed out at this point, so most new things are just current or old concepts that are updated to a competitive level based on newer printings. A deck like Goblins is an example of that, but Slow Depths is as well (basically an evolution of B/G Rock).

I don't really see the problem here. There is enough variation in archetype between the various blue decks, combo decks, aggro decks, and Chalice decks to make for a diverse metagame as it is. You still have fun ramp decks like Cloudpost and Lands, and there are plenty of competitive hybrid decks that mix combo, aggro, and/or control to keep the format interesting, like Elves.

Looking through various top 8's on mtgtop8, I see a pretty diverse spread of decks from month to month, with plenty of new archetypes popping up all of the time. Even if some decks become flavor of the month for a little while, while older decks fade away for a little while, doesn't mean that those decks aren't still competitive or viable. People sometimes get bored of the same old thing and like to try something new; other times, new card printings invigorate interest in something people have forgotten about.

If you want to talk about stale metagames, most Standards usually have like 3 or 4 decks that are light-years better than everything else, which usually results in a rock paper scissors situation. Legacy isn't remotely close to coming to that, and I doubt it ever will.

There is still plenty of design space to make new things, or put dramatic spins on existing things. Legacy just isn't a popular enough format to drive that sort of innovation as fast as newer cards keep getting printed, unfortunately. Newer card printings driving new innovation instead is not necessarily a bad thing, though. Legacy will always be a format with enough freedom to brew, while still having some collection of popular decks considered to be DTB. It's been like this since I started playing Legacy in 2006.

People like to constantly complain about the state of Legacy no matter what the situation or actual state of things is. After a while, you learn to ignore the banter and enjoy the format for what it is at each given point in time.

[Mr. Safety]

Cards like Ancient Stirrings and Once Upon a Time seem like a great step in that direction, in addition to Allosaurus as already mentioned. Of course there is already GSZ, but there's other cards that can do this as well, such Faithless Looting and Light up the Stage.

Expecting decks to not want to build around combos when possible also isn't feasible, because the ability to assemble them within the card pool offers too much payoff for the cost/investment.

People like to constantly complain about the state of Legacy no matter what the situation or actual state of things is. After a while, you learn to ignore the banter and enjoy the format for what it is at each given point in time.

I trimmed a little, but I really agree with this post. I've enjoyed legacy at each stage since I started playing, which was right before Survival was banned. I'm ok with legacy becoming vintage 2.0, because the direction WOTC is obviously going doesn't allow for the bans needed to slow the inevitable change. Just my opinion, but I really think it will happen.

[non-inflammable]

Banning fetches or Brainstorm essentially creates a new format and invalidates the reason WOTC lets Legacy exist.

Banning one card makes a new format and invalidates all of legacy. Don't be a BS shill; it's now almost a trope...


We can 1) advocate for A BRAINSTORM BAN to keep this power creep from turning the format into Vintage 2.0.

BS is a sacred cow, until we advocate that it isn't.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

According mtggoldfish, and results from the last big event I cared about Legacy is over 50% brainstorm, and to me, when one half of your format is one card your format is unhealthy and needs fixing.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

BS is a sacred cow, until we advocate that it isn't.
Always slaughter your sacred cows. You can't take them to the promised land.

[Hanni]

According mtggoldfish, and results from the last big event I cared about Legacy is over 50% brainstorm, and to me, when one half of your format is one card your format is unhealthy and needs fixing.

That's been the case since the beginning of Legacy. It's a ubiquitous card that fits easily into nearly any deck. It fits in aggro, control, and combo, as well as various hybrids of those. It's not like we're talking about a card like Flash, that literally defines a single deck. You can make other cases for why or why not it should be banned, but basing it strictly on the amount of decks that run it is one if the loosest arguments against it. Should we also be banning other ubiquitous cards that see play in multiple different decks, like Wasteland or Force of Will?

[FTW]

Misty Rainforest sees more play than Marsh Flats or Hungry Hungry Heifer. Take out all tha sacred cows!

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

That's been the case since the beginning of Legacy. It's a ubiquitous card that fits easily into nearly any deck. It fits in aggro, control, and combo, as well as various hybrids of those. It's not like we're talking about a card like Flash, that literally defines a single deck. You can make other cases for why or why not it should be banned, but basing it strictly on the amount of decks that run it is one if the loosest arguments against it. Should we also be banning other ubiquitous cards that see play in multiple different decks, like Wasteland or Force of Will?
Yes, that is why they have allowed the problem to persist so long.
If they get to be as big as brainstorm yes.
It's actually one of the tightest arguments because how ubiquitous a card is is simply a numbers game. Numbers we can readily compute. We can set a threshold and ban anything other than basic lands that meet that threshold.

[Stevestamopz]

People like to constantly complain about the state of Legacy no matter what the situation or actual state of things is. After a while, you learn to ignore the banter and enjoy the format for what it is at each given point in time.

The problem is that I'm not enjoying the format and judging by the 8 trillion legacy-centric podcasts that are out there right now, not many other people are either. I wrote my post to see if it was just me and again it seems it's not just me.

I note that no one had any issues with the Pre-War/MH meta either.

[Fox]

Legacy is as fine as it always was. Any time something fun an interesting comes along and shakes up the format it usually gets banned. Outside of these fun interludes [things like DTT, Breach, and Lurrus eras] legacy returns to the same boring orbit of Tarmogoyf [until Snapcaster was printed], then total hand destruction [Shardless/SCM + Hymn, CB +/- SDT, Probe/Sea/Therapy in Grixis Delver], and now Oko [currently the only thing preventing legacy’s regression to total hand destruction crap].

When Goyf was unchallenged you had to suffer through a card that can’t even kill itself in a 1v1; “if you can’t beat em, join em” doesn’t work in the face of such horrid card design. When total hand destruction reigned, you had to deal with up to 3 flavors of overpowered nonsense at the same time [only 2 after Probe ban]. Now you deal with just one card, your hand isn’t getting devastated, and unlike Goyf, Oko is a card you can play effectively if you chose the “can’t beat em, join em” path.

The cast and crew around these underlying problems rotates with power creep, but at it’s heart is the same cheese where people are exploiting something that clearly shouldn’t be legal. This nonsense rides around 20-30% at any given time. While Oko most certainly needs to be banned, it is quite enjoyable watching the previously total hand destruction exploiters getting a taste of their own medicine. Unlike CB and Hymn, Oko is a card that can be shoveled back in their faces from Fetchlands (Maverick, Infect, Aluren/Food Chain, Delver), Loam/Mox (Lands, AggroLoam), Sol Land/Chalice (some Echo Cannon decks), and hybrids like SnT. The only archetype that can’t really shovel Oko back is Cavern/Vial.

Watching the previous exploiters suffer, being denied their 1-sided easy mode, is a delightful silver lining during the reign of Oko.

[phonics]

According mtggoldfish, and results from the last big event I cared about Legacy is over 50% brainstorm, and to me, when one half of your format is one card your format is unhealthy and needs fixing.

I think that 50% is actually historically relatively low/average, the lowest I remember was when maverick was top tier, I think around when ZEN came out, when brainstorm was around 40% iirc. The highest was like 75-80% when around Khans when Treasure Cruise and DTT were in the format. Discussion about BS is irrelevant anyways since they have basically established that banning it is not even on the table.

[Hanni]

The problem is that I'm not enjoying the format and judging by the 8 trillion legacy-centric podcasts that are out there right now, not many other people are either. I wrote my post to see if it was just me and again it seems it's not just me.

I note that no one had any issues with the Pre-War/MH meta either.

Maybe that's the case for you and for some others right now, but I've heard people say the same thing throughout the many years I've been around.

People are always unhappy and want something banned. Back in 2006 it was Goblin Lackey. In 2007 it was Tarmogoyf. Sometimes people scream loud enough and cards do get banned, like Sensei's Divining Top and Deathrite Shaman did.

I'm personally happy with the current format, as I have been happy at every other iteration that Legacy has gone through. Other people are never happy with it. Luckily, there are a number of other formats that can cater to those people.

[pettdan]

If you're happy with every format ever, this raises a couple of questions.. Can you even evaluate format health (image of dog in burning house comes to mind)? Legacy has been quite bad at times. Why not let others have their changes if it doesn't matter to you, you'll be happy regardless. With that said, of course one can join the discussion for the sake of discussion anyway, nothing wrong with that.

No, people aren't always unhappy, we wrote about this on at least two places on this page, I'll write it a third time, basically everyone was very happy before WotS, the statement of complainers never being content is clearly wrong, it actually seems like irrational complaining (how ironic). Discontent is widespread and strong in the community, now there are players who don't care about format diversity, they don't play the decks that are hurt by the bad printings and they don't understand that there's a problem because their style of decks (maybe something with a combo in it or brainstorm+fow) isn't affected. If you don't understand the problem it's of course ok, but I think you should be able to recognise widespread discontent.

[Zoid]

If you're happy with every format ever, this raises a couple of questions.. Can you even evaluate format health (image of dog in burning house comes to mind)? Legacy has been quite bad at times. Why not let others have their changes if it doesn't matter to you, you'll be happy regardless. With that said, of course one can join the discussion for the sake of discussion anyway, nothing wrong with that.

No, people aren't always unhappy, we wrote about this on at least two places on this page, I'll write it a third time, basically everyone was very happy before WotS, the statement of complainers never being content is clearly wrong, it actually seems like irrational complaining (how ironic). Discontent is widespread and strong in the community, now there are players who don't care about format diversity, they don't play the decks that aren't hurt by the bad printings and they don't understand that there's a problem because their style of decks (maybe something with a combo in it or brainstorm+fow) isn't affected. If you don't understand the problem it's of course ok, but I think you should be able to recognise widespread discontent.

While I kind of envy his contentedness, it actually shines a light on the most important question.
What matters most is how to make the format so that people actually want to play it.
Currently I don't see that.

It will be interesting to see which format can recover once in person playing will be possible again, but given the current prices, I would assume everyone leaving legacy will not return.
Given that online play is being moved to arena, legacy on modo will also die sooner or later.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

While I kind of envy his contentedness, it actually shines a light on the most important question.
What matters most is how to make the format so that people actually want to play it.
Currently I don't see that.

It will be interesting to see which format can recover once in person playing will be possible again, but given the current prices, I would assume everyone leaving legacy will not return.
Given that online play is being moved to arena, legacy on modo will also die sooner or later.

People leaving legacy is good for prices (esp online) and that's good for there player base, but that's outside this thread

[Sella]

Yes, that is why they have allowed the problem to persist so long.
If they get to be as big as brainstorm yes.
It's actually one of the tightest arguments because how ubiquitous a card is is simply a numbers game. Numbers we can readily compute. We can set a threshold and ban anything other than basic lands that meet that threshold.

That sounds like a pretty awful idea tbh

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

That sounds like a pretty awful idea tbh

So is legacy right now.

[Stevestamopz]

If you're happy with every format ever, this raises a couple of questions.. Can you even evaluate format health (image of dog in burning house comes to mind)? Legacy has been quite bad at times. Why not let others have their changes if it doesn't matter to you, you'll be happy regardless. With that said, of course one can join the discussion for the sake of discussion anyway, nothing wrong with that.

This ^
I also don't want this discussion to devolve into ad hominems of "you guys always complain, look how good I am for not" - which it seems it was heading to.


While I kind of envy his contentedness, it actually shines a light on the most important question.
What matters most is how to make the format so that people actually want to play it.
Currently I don't see that.

My main concern too.

[Hanni]

I was just pointing out that the complaint arguments are cylical. Just have a gander through the 1145 pages of this thread if you don't want to believe what I'm saying.

There are just as many viable decks in the format as there has been at any other point, and just as much design space for brewing and innovation.

Either way, I'm not sure why I even decided to post in here. Carry on.

[Sella]

So is legacy right now.

I don't like Legacy much these days either.

----------------------


I was just pointing out that the complaint arguments are cylical.
How so?


Just have a gander through the 1145 pages of this thread if you don't want to believe what I'm saying.
No.


There are just as many viable decks in the format as there has been at any other point,
I wouldn't say the issue is necessarily the number of viable decks, but rather the number of viable archetypes/playstyles/whatever you want to call it.
50 shades of Delver is still, well, all Delver


and just as much design space for brewing and innovation.
Not in a good way imho (innovating neat decks is fine, innovating off the back of 3-4c untouchable manabases a-la-astrolabe is probably unhealthy)


Either way, I'm not sure why I even decided to post in here. Carry on.
We will.

[Secretly.A.Bee]

Your post was fun, Sella. It made me smile.

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk

[Wrath of Pie]

People leaving legacy is good for prices (esp online) and that's good for there player base, but that's outside this thread
Definitely good for the paper playbase, that means Commander has access to more dual lands.

[pettdan]

I was just pointing out that the complaint arguments are cylical. Just have a gander through the 1145 pages of this thread if you don't want to believe what I'm saying.

There are just as many viable decks in the format as there has been at any other point, and just as much design space for brewing and innovation.

Either way, I'm not sure why I even decided to post in here. Carry on.

Certainly didn't mean to scare/offend you away, I just wanted to put the statement in another light. Anyway, do as you prefer, and welcome back whenever you feel like discussing things.

Being cyclical doesn't mean there is no problem causing it. Recessions are cyclical, it doesn't make them less of a problem. The relevant thing to note here was, imo, that the vast majority are sometimes happy with the format. I can't really prove that but consuming a lot of Legacy content daily for years gives some sort of interpretation of events, trends etc. There can be different interpretations too, I'm just providing mine. Edit: to be more clear, the cyclical problems aren't some kind of natural complaint cycle, it's caused by an unhealthy format.

[itslarryyo]

Definitely good for the paper playbase, that means Commander has access to more dual lands.

It uses to be "how can we expand the players base, we need moar people and bigger tournaments", now there is excitement over how poorly things are being run and that people are bouncing.

2020 is weird.

[Barook]

Balanced Standard is balanced (https://twitter.com/fffreakmtg/status/1309954329424527360/photo/1)

Looks like Uro might get a bit cheaper. Although I doubt just hammering Uro is going to see the effect WotC wishes to see. This whole F.I.R.E. design philosophy is throughly fucked. Even if they ban something, then players will flock around the next pushed card until it gets banned, too. Repeat ad nauseam.

While it seems to be the new business strategy to please Hasbro's shareholders, this isn't going to be sustainable forever, as more and more people are getting turned off.

[morgan_coke]

Balanced Standard is balanced (https://twitter.com/fffreakmtg/status/1309954329424527360/photo/1)

Looks like Uro might get a bit cheaper. Although I doubt just hammering Uro is going to see the effect WotC wishes to see. This whole F.I.R.E. design philosophy is throughly fucked. Even if they ban something, then players will flock around the next pushed card until it gets banned, too. Repeat ad nauseam.

While it seems to be the new business strategy to please Hasbro's shareholders, this isn't going to be sustainable forever, as more and more people are getting turned off.

Uro and Fabled Passage at the minimum need to go. Winota and Ugin can take a hike as well. I'm just assuming that everything in Zendikar is off limits for bans right now. Those four plus Lucky Clover would cover most of the issues in standard, except for the overabundance of Flash creatures they've gotten away with for the last two years while Teferi was keeping them down.

[Mr. Safety]

Is there an announcement coming today?

[Fox]

Is there an announcement coming today?
Uro is about to get repriced if the announcement is the be believed. It was something along the lines of no emergent changes this past weekend for tournament integrity blah blah.

[PirateKing]

Uro banned in Standard (https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/news/september-28-2020-banned-and-restricted-announcement-2020-09-28)

[H]

Nice, I grabbed three on Friday, on Arena. So now I get my 3 wildcards back, plus the one I already had from a pack. I really only play Historic on there anyway.

[Wrath of Pie]

Uro banned in Standard (https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/news/september-28-2020-banned-and-restricted-announcement-2020-09-28)
Don't worry, someone on Twitter (https://twitter.com/nicknprince/status/1310589784595726337) already solved the new Standard.

[Ronald Deuce]

Don't worry, someone on Twitter (https://twitter.com/nicknprince/status/1310589784595726337) already solved the new Standard.

Heck, you could buy a Legacy deck for the price of those!

[phonics]

Balanced Standard is balanced (https://twitter.com/fffreakmtg/status/1309954329424527360/photo/1)

Looks like Uro might get a bit cheaper. Although I doubt just hammering Uro is going to see the effect WotC wishes to see. This whole F.I.R.E. design philosophy is throughly fucked. Even if they ban something, then players will flock around the next pushed card until it gets banned, too. Repeat ad nauseam.

While it seems to be the new business strategy to please Hasbro's shareholders, this isn't going to be sustainable forever, as more and more people are getting turned off.

Maybe that just doesn't matter, from what I have seen mtg seems to be more popular than ever. They can cycle from broken format to broken format, banning busted cards after they have sold their packs. It can just shift towards a hearthstone like ecosystem where 'pros' are content creator/ advertisers to an increasingly mainstream audience of arena and commander players. The disgruntled playerbase that leaves will be dwarfed by the larger mainstream geek demographic, who wotc wants more of anyways because they are the ones buy all the collectors editions, funko pops and other crossover merch stuff while established players just buy singles or product only to draft with.

[Barook]

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EjBrtHuXYAIM0d7?format=jpg&name=large

Watching this thing go off, even post-Uro, is a thing to behold. Shitting out 100+ hasted trample power in single turn is nothing to sneeze at. How Lotus Cobra still remains legal in Standard aside from WotC being in full greed mode is beyond me.


Maybe that just doesn't matter, from what I have seen mtg seems to be more popular than ever.
Really? I haven't followed the recent numbers, especially with Corona screwing things up.

[the Thin White Duke]

It seems to me like they banned the wrong card. If this was 6-8 months ago, good ban. However, at this point there are more relevant cards to axe. Wizards really phoned this one in. There was zero actual thought put into this decision.
Not that I actually plan Standard, but when I do it's lame to watch your opponent jack off with Omnath/ lotus cobra or just ramp into Ugin turn 5.

[Barook]

It seems to me like they banned the wrong card. If this was 6-8 months ago, good ban. However, at this point there are more relevant cards to axe. Wizards really phoned this one in. There was zero actual thought put into this decision.
Not that I actually plan Standard, but when I do it's lame to watch your opponent jack off with Omnath/ lotus cobra or just ramp into Ugin turn 5.
It's kinda hilarious that WotC's stance is that BoP is too good for Standard when Elvish Mystic caused zero issues during its latest Standard run. Yet printing a bazillion ramp spells with effectively zero countermeasures is a-ok.

I expect Lotus Cobra (and Omnath) being banned in about a month or so, depending when most of the packs are sold. That seems to be WotC's new modus operandi under F.I.R.E. - print a bunch of overpowered shit, then ban it later when the set has run its course saleswise.

For Eternal formats, that's disasterous, as overpowered shit keeps getting dumped into the formats, with actions taking years more often than not.

[morgan_coke]

The single funniest thing about the Uro ban is that it pushed people into trying Omnath in the Temur Adventures shell - which it turns out is an even higher power deck than the previous Omnath Ramp shell was. I played the new hotness today just running my dailies. Went from 85% Mythic to 95% Mythic. Only loss was to a U/B Tempo Rogues deck that drew (and milled me) absolutely perfectly, and it was still really close in the end.

It's pretty simple, you can have a format with Omnath or one with fetches, but not both. Omnath probably means no Cobra too. Just freaking mindboggling. The whole thing. I'm honestly shocked Uro was the only thing that got banned. Of course, I never understood how Nissa and Krasis both survived their entire time in standard either, so what do I know?

[phonics]

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EjBrtHuXYAIM0d7?format=jpg&name=large

Watching this thing go off, even post-Uro, is a thing to behold. Shitting out 100+ hasted trample power in single turn is nothing to sneeze at. How Lotus Cobra still remains legal in Standard aside from WotC being in full greed mode is beyond me.


Really? I haven't followed the recent numbers, especially with Corona screwing things up.

Covid aside, iirc they said 2019 was their best year yet, they have been growing yoy for a while. Arena is hitting its stride now their marketing team is going into overdrive with all these special crossovers. Also the promotional videos they make actually trend on youtube when they release and the netflix thing that appears to be happening as well.

[Zoid]

If I wasn't so addicted and bored, I would have deleted arena a long time ago.

I stopped playing standard before Fires got banned and it didn't improve much.
Seeing how the format got basically instantly solved, it seems I made the right call.
However, it's not like historic is much better either.
Most of the time I see BUG Nissa+Uro+Ugin+Krasis pile.
At least it's not goblins that can kill you from hellbent with a Muxus topdeck.

Brawl has been somewhat enjoyable, even if it's just because all these braindead Omnath netdeckers keep folding to my Snapdax after they drop their Omnath.

Maybe it's their strategy to push everyone into singleton formats because you don't have to see the same op crap every game and even if you do, they only have 1 copy, excluding the commander.

[Tylert]

If I wasn't so addicted and bored, I would have deleted arena a long time ago.

I stopped playing standard before Fires got banned and it didn't improve much.
Seeing how the format got basically instantly solved, it seems I made the right call.
However, it's not like historic is much better either.
Most of the time I see BUG Nissa+Uro+Ugin+Krasis pile.
At least it's not goblins that can kill you from hellbent with a Muxus topdeck.

Brawl has been somewhat enjoyable, even if it's just because all these braindead Omnath netdeckers keep folding to my Snapdax after they drop their Omnath.

Maybe it's their strategy to push everyone into singleton formats because you don't have to see the same op crap every game and even if you do, they only have 1 copy, excluding the commander.

Limited is fine :)
especially since you can go infinite easily once you have 10000 golds in this format which not bomb oriented :)

[morgan_coke]

The stuff, they banned it in Standard.

[Wrath of Pie]

Cardboard Crack is back and more importantly is actually funny once in a while.

https://64.media.tumblr.com/110536f566c6e4126b9cdf9ba1221a2c/a476efc6d9071ad6-94/s500x750/407c5b1b76e84440af3925aa0b47fca49bcaa511.jpg

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

cardboard crack is back and more importantly is actually funny once in a while.


mods!

[H]

mods!

On it!

https://i.imgur.com/ogzyK6j.jpg

[Mr. Safety]

Pretty good podcast dropped on EternalGlory. It isn't up on the website yet but it's available to listen. Lots of talk about Dreadhorde Arcanist and Oko, Thief of Grounds.

https://www.theeternalglorypodcast.com/

EDIT: Side note, these guys are putting out the best legacy content, easily, based only on the podcast. Add in the efforts with YouTube content, streaming, and running their individual websites and it's basically tier 0.

[Fox]

Yeah, they need to stop trying to sneak in bad ban ideas. It's ban Oko, and just Oko. Just take away PW-killer from Astrolabe, and watch cards like Lilly, Last Hope cover for the role DRS would have fulfilled. It's a 1/3 that dies to removal, in an environment moving back to black and Cling to Dust. This is a waste of a ban.

The card you care about after an Oko ban is Echo of Eons above all others. Now this is a messy one b/c you also have to hit Day's Undoing [which doesn't make sense], and end up needing to ban a card we shouldn't have to in Hullbreacher. No matter what though, Echo has to get axed first in this sequence, before a Zirda-style quality of life ban on Hull/Days.

[Reeplcheep]

I agree that arcanist might not be bannable with oko gone. Arcanist trades down with leyline, bolt, plow, plague engineer etc. Encouraging more creature interaction and less pyroblast is good and it is a 2 mana creature that literally dies to doom blade at card and tempo parity. The fact that it pushes out all 2 damage removal (pfire) is bad but I am not sure if that makes it bannable.

The problem is if you have a deck with plow, chalice, cage, cling etc you just get dumpstered by oko right now. Untapping with a 2 drop=you win is a horrible play pattern, but library and elvish reclaimer are similar.

If all the premier blue threats both use the gy (uro/arcanist/echo/sanctuary, goyf and mandrills become better in the mirror with oko gone) and are vulnerable to 3ball and chalice that is healthy imo. With oko gone blue needs to choose between powerful and flexible/resilient threats instead of having everything.

[Mr. Safety]

Listen to the podcast, it's really good. You'll find your points, and much more, all included in there from some of the best legacy content producers.

[Reeplcheep]

Listen to the podcast, it's really good. You'll find your points, and much more, all included in there from some of the best legacy content producers.

I’m subscribed to Phil’s twitch and have listened to every one since the summer. I was trying to echo that all their points about uro apply to arcanist except mana cost. It slots in easily to blue decks too and negates the issue of force of negationing everything. Moreover, arcanist is not a banedrifter. It is a very good bane slayer. Uro is a banedrifter that puts you ahead even if you have a surgical or plow immediately. I counter the “if the opponent escapedy uro multiple times, a real game was played” with if I play a 2 drop and you kill it with any non-of legacy legal removal spell, we are actually interacting. Vs hard gy hate the snow player still has a explore with gain 3 life and , if they have karakas, buyback. That is a much better card than a 2 mana 1/3.

Kill me immediately or die creatures have always existed in legacy (blighted agent, goblin lackey). They require more build around than arcanist but actually end the game immediately (the age old JTMS vs show & tell debate) I contest that playing against a quick snowbally threat is bad (they just daze everything and you lose) but the force everything keep casting uro playstyle is even worse. The way to beat arcanist is play more cheap removal (when that isn’t punished by oko), which is healthy. The way to beat uro is play uninteractive comboes or emrakul which is bad.

But oko must go. It’s the common link and the most played card.

4C Loam and Stompy destroy arcanist. 12 post and oops destroy oko (& uro). Which deck is having success right now should tell you which card is the truly problematic one.

[Mr. Safety]

Yeah, I saw you even had a brew get used by boshnroll. I was really responding to Fox.

[Fox]

I mean I listened to the podcast, but the thing is none of those three content creators understand that if Oko can't turn turn Astro into a PW killer that 4 Ponder, 4 BS, 4 Astro, 4 DHA = decisively losing to pretty much every legacy playable 3 drop PW. DHA is not a problem worthy of banning.

[non-inflammable]

i agree with above ^^, but just ban brainstorm...

what would happen to the meta? what could you unban?

i actually care less and less.
i've played legacy maybe three times in the last 10 months. also, i just sold 99% of my foils and about half my duals; good times...

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

Brainstorm or fetches.
Preferable both and ponder too.
Preordain I'm give you a chance

[Tobitzki]

Kill me immediately or die creatures have always existed in legacy..

But oko must go. It’s the common link and the most played card.



(@Fox, too) good to read some sense over here. I've already been yelling into the void about it on reddit: I mean fuck DHA from a design- and flavor perspective, but there's just no real case for banning him at this point. Fact is, no deck that plays DHA but not Oko is a problem. A 2-drop that gets answered by every conceivable piece of removal AND GY hate in the format, or just gets blocked dead, should be manageable in a post-Oko world. Card's is obviously very powerful, but at this point there's a bit of hysteria about him I think.

[Zoid]

Given that the new set just came out, I guess my hopes are in vain but I would really like some bans in historic and brawl.

I've long given up on standard but historic has been fairly enjoyable until it fully turned into the Uro+Nissa+Krasis and baking with kittens show.
It's so boring.
If it's not a variation of these 2 decks, you get shit gobos which can win from hellbent with Muxus.lol or some stupid combo deck.

Brawl has been actually fun since you don't have to play against 4x of the most aids cards in the format.
However there are some commanders which just provide too much value which you can't do anything about.
Kennrith is the prime example, but there are a few others like Kinnan.

Considering how long people have been stuck at home, I'm surprised that they haven't made any qol bans just to make arena a bit fun to play.

[non-inflammable]

I'm playing lots of historic; went to mythic in 3 weeks and spent about $10.
The one card that is nuts against Uro is Valki, God of Lies. It is so sweet to just take their Uro and then "be" their Uro.

I'll have to check out brawl since I'm only doing draft and historic, right now.

[H]

https://i.imgur.com/BIyQIqF.png

Hidden in this article. (https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/news/announcing-secret-lairs-smitten-superdrop-2021-02-10)

So, maybe Uro for us as well? Or, Valki too? Or, might they just change the rules to address that?

[BKclassic]

Hard to imagine Uro gets banned without an Oko ban. As long as Dreadhorde doesn't get banned, RUG will be a clear winner regardless of what they do.

[Barook]

I don't think that they're going to ban Valki. If they do anything about, they'll just change how Cascade works (because casting a 7 mana walker from a cmc 2 cascasde is fucking stupid to begin with). Not that they would do it right away, as there's still money to be made from Valki.

As for Legacy, I would love to see Uro and Oko getting banhammered. Astrolabe and DHA are also on my list, but with lower priority.

[H]

I don't think that they're going to ban Valki. If they do anything about, they'll just change how Cascade works (because casting a 7 mana walker from a cmc 2 cascasde is fucking stupid to begin with). Not that they would do it right away, as there's still money to be made from Valki.

As for Legacy, I would love to see Uro and Oko getting banhammered. Astrolabe and DHA are also on my list, but with lower priority.

Fair points, in fact, we don't know if the meta can adjust for Valki, since it's only been one weekend.

As for Uro/Oko, it is hard to argue, since both are stupidly powerful cards. I am fine if either go and it would not surprise me if both did. They've had their time, honestly. As for Astrolabe, I am still on the fence. Again, it is a powerful card, but I am not against it out of hand. Dreadhorde Arcanist I think is just a really powerful card, but I don't really think it is all that busted.

[Zoid]

Does it really make sense to ban astrolabe before taking Oko behind the shed and shooting it a million times?
Enabling Wasteland-proof rainbow mana bases is stupid but if you can't turn it into a wincon I'd imagine it to be less annoying.

Also if they ban Uro they also have to ban other things in Arena as well.
Something from the sacrifice deck has to go too because that deck is so stupid that people maindeck hate against it.
I would enjoy a Muxus ban as well because that card is just stupid.

[Reeplcheep]

I sounds to me like they are banning oko and considering other things in legacy.

Banning labe in a format with ancient tomb, fetches, and daze makes no sense at all. If you can give up colours for +1 mana and get 3 colours for no cost, getting all the colours for -1 mana is totally fine. The problem is oko gives your lost tempo back for free almost immediately. Labe in 3feri decks or painter is not killing anyone.

[Fox]

So maverick is a pretty good proxy for any fair deck that uses Fetchlands without cantrips over Loam/Mox or Cavern/Vial. This entire way of playing will never be able to stop auto-losing Valki Cannon, and this is now you know they will fix the cascade glitch that results in a 2-drop that is immune to Snare, unkicked Bloodchief's, Eliminate, Decay, EE for 2 etc...

This problem is as profound as Breach was for them.

[Gruul]

I believe Uro should belong with a format, and that format has to be Legacy (while Oko has a nice place in Vintage).

I think the ban of Oko is happening, I'm with Reelcheep on this one. It would seem fairly precautious to ban Oko first then take time to see whether Uro needs to go as well. The Note seems to imply they might want to ban Uro right away though... oh well.

Pioneer has many balance & variety issues, I doubt Uro's ban will be enough to give the format a second breath.

[DungeonShade]

Does it really make sense to ban astrolabe before taking Oko behind the shed and shooting it a million times?
Enabling Wasteland-proof rainbow mana bases is stupid but if you can't turn it into a wincon I'd imagine it to be less annoying.

I think it could make sense. I do not see the 'default best cards wasteland-proof rainbow mana base' deck becoming less annoying or ubiquitous while killing multiple other decks. Unlock all the different 3 color control/mid range decks, basic lands, and make non-basic hate relevant ffs. Starting with Astrolabe lets weirdos who enjoy playing Oko/Uro/Dreadhorde continue to use those cards and not ragequit Legacy (but by all means ban them anyway). Does anyone really LOVE their Astrolabes? Please... Also I hope everyone is off the weak argument that it makes Legacy more affordable - the 3 color control decks should all be playing basics with minimal duals anyway or get risk getting punished. We even have prismatic vista now.

I'm happy to see any 2019+ cards go. If we have to balance it out between Snowko/Rug then ban Astrolabe and Dreadhorde. Wouldn't miss Oko/Uro one bit either.

[FTW]

This problem is as profound as Breach was for them.

It's even more profound, so I expect a rules nerf even sooner.

Underworld Breach was very powerful but at least interactive and complex to pilot. There were dozens of ways to disrupt or interact with the combo that led to complex decision trees for both the Breach pilot and the opponent. Breach's design opened up entire metagames over how it tried to fight predicted hate and how to hate it out around that board plan. Hallmark fair decks like Maverick and D&T did very well against it, once they adapted their hatebear suite. So did other random fair decks like Lands and EldraziPost. If fair decks are highly favored against a combo deck, the format can't be THAT unhealthy.

Breach was still unfair because it was a Vintage deck in Legacy with Oath/Will-like "oops I win", but at least there were games of Magic happening and next-level boarding tricks.

In contrast, Valki is a turn 1 planeswalker cannon that's very linear to pilot and allows for much less interaction. Fair decks like Maverick don't stand a chance.

[Barook]

It would seem fairly precautious to ban Oko first then take time to see whether Uro needs to go as well.
I think one of the biggest problems Legacy has is that it often takes too long to ban obviously problematic cards to the point where they stay around for years. DTT comes into mind, being legal for an entire year. Or SDT's reign of terror for several years straight. DRS is a bit more complex, as it also had the benefit of policing the format.

A card that's fighting with Oko for deck slots is just as problematic as Oko itself and has to go.

[Fox]

If you still don't realize that Oko is the clear and obvious ban,, then it's time you listened to Bruce Springsteen: you can't start a FIRE without a spark. In this song he is clearly talking about Astrolabe being mostly unplayable with Oko losing his spark, and the cascading decline of decks' abilities to use Uro, DHA, Veil, Ice Fang.
#DesparkOko

[BirdsOfParadise]

What problem are we trying to address? What are we optimizing for?

What problems are mitigated by banning Card X or Card Y that aren't mitigated more by banning Brainstorm? ("WotC won't ban Brainstorm": What makes you think they read this thread in the first place?)

[FTW]

What problem?

You shouldn't be able to cascade into a "2 cmc" card that doesn't have 2 cmc for cards like Decay, Bloodchief's Thirst, Spell Snare, EE, etc. Either the card has just one CMC that applies to both faces or only the front face is seen. It's just a dumb loophole.

[BirdsOfParadise]

What problem?

You shouldn't be able to cascade into a "2 cmc" card that doesn't have 2 cmc for cards like Decay, Bloodchief's Thirst, Spell Snare, EE, etc. Either the card has just one CMC that applies to both faces or only the front face is seen. It's just a dumb loophole.
Oh --- hopefully my comment didn't sound like I was calling you out, since I wan't intending to. I was more trying to understand the mindset of banning Oko/Uro/Astrolabe/Dreadhorde. I honestly can't think of any reasonable criterion for banning any of those that doesn't apply twice as much to Brainstorm.

The loophole you're complaining about is nonsense, of course, and I wouldn't shed a tear if they closed it. But to some extent Legacy is about finding nonsense interactions to abuse; if the way of abusing them involves enough hoops to jump through and constraints on deck building, then it's seen as fun and fair.

As long as we're talking about it, though, what would be wrong with Cascade + Valki being the best deck? What are we worried about, format diversity? It's Legacy. Great players would still be able to good results with medium decks if they wanted to prove a point.

[chunderbucket]

The main issue with Tibalt is that it's a broken non-blue card and that's absolutely haram to legacy players. It should join SDT and DRS in the banlist so people can enjoy their skillful plays with Delver/Oko/Uro/8 cantrips/8 forces in peace.

[Fox]

The main issue with Tibalt is that it's a broken non-blue card and that's absolutely haram to legacy players. It should join SDT and DRS in the banlist so people can enjoy their skillful plays with Delver/Oko/Uro/8 cantrips/8 forces in peace.

You do understand that Valki Cannon is devastating anything non-blue and fair right? Blue decks don't actually give a crap about Valki; it's not that hard to add Stifle and SB BEB +/- upping copies of FoN. There is zero difference between Valki Cannon and Oops for us blue mages - but I guarantee you that there's one helluva difference between Valki Cannon and Oops if your deck is anything remotely resembling Maverick.

[Cire]

You do understand that Valki Cannon is devastating anything non-blue and fair right? Blue decks don't actually give a crap about Valki; it's not that hard to add Stifle and SB BEB +/- upping copies of FoN. There is zero difference between Valki Cannon and Oops for us blue mages - but I guarantee you that there's one helluva difference between Valki Cannon and Oops if your deck is anything remotely resembling Maverick.

That's their fault for not playing blue to begin with. What are they? Peasants? Just roll up a random blue stew (mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?33488-BlueStew-net-A-Random-Blue-Midrange-Generator) and get to playing legacy!

[Mr. Safety]

If you still don't realize that Oko is the clear and obvious ban,, then it's time you listened to Bruce Springsteen: you can't start a FIRE without a spark. In this song he is clearly talking about Astrolabe being mostly unplayable with Oko losing his spark, and the cascading decline of decks' abilities to use Uro, DHA, Veil, Ice Fang.
#DesparkOko

I agree with you about Astrolabe. Having a bullet-proof mana-base is perfectly reasonable in Legacy; Wasteland doesn't absolutely have to be good against every deck. There might be a fringe deck that still plays Labe if Oko gets banned, but that should be perfectly fine. I honestly think there are applications that haven't been explored with it because just jamming it with Oko is better than any jank synergy you could come up with. I look at cards like Reshape and Transmute Artifact, Mox Opal, Lotus Bloom, Urza and Second Sunrise. Astrolabe making the mana-base strong while being a sacrifice target in artifact shenanigans seems like a good time.

[chunderbucket]

You do understand that Valki Cannon is devastating anything non-blue and fair right? Blue decks don't actually give a crap about Valki; it's not that hard to add Stifle and SB BEB +/- upping copies of FoN. There is zero difference between Valki Cannon and Oops for us blue mages - but I guarantee you that there's one helluva difference between Valki Cannon and Oops if your deck is anything remotely resembling Maverick.

Fine then. Let's ban Valki so Maverick players can pretend they have a standing chance against Blue Stew + whetever broken blue cards Wizard will print this year. On the other hand, touching Oko, Uro, Force of Negation, Delver, TNN, Ponder or any of the bullshit printed in the last 10 years that makes blue the best color at basically every aspect of the game is basically unthinkable because it would force blue players to *gasp* adapt to the metagame or even *the horror* switch to a strategy that's not 3-4c goodstuff. What a nightmare this would be, adapting a deck to a metagame beyond 5 flex slots.

[FTW]

Oko should go.

Astrolabe is fine. The card is balanced when it isn't a haste 3/3.

TNN hasn't seen play in ages. Can it even make Elks? What a waste of 3 mana.

[chunderbucket]

Anyway here is my Objectively Superior™ banlist proposal that preserves Fun&Diversity As Garfield Intended®

Banned: True-Name Nemesis, Oko, Uro (just obvious and unfun mistakes), Delver (who the hell thought it was a good idea to give blue the best aggressive creature) Ponder, Preordain (we'll let you keep brainstorm because we know you can't get an erection without it but the other cantrips absolutely have to go), Daze, Force of Negation (we let you keep Force of Will, that's it. pay for your spells like everyone else) Volcanic Island, Underground Sea, Tundra, Tropical Island (that's right blue your manabase sucks now. we'll let you keep Basic Island so Merfolk can still thrive)

Don't worry, you still have Brainstorm, Jace, Snapcaster, Force of Will, Brazen Borrower, all the cheap countermagic, 8 strixes, and so on; I'm sure you can cook up some 3-4c goodstuff stew if the mere thought of a deck with actual flavor repels you.

Maybe banned: Emrakul, Griselbrand (just dumb cards that don't care about gamestate. on the other hand combo might be too nerfed), Leovold, Hullbreacher, Narset (absolutely dumb and miserable to play against, but enable interesting combos with the draw 7s so w/e)

Show and Tell is dumb but dropping big things is fun so it stays in. Astrolabe and DHA stay good but probably won't be problematic once all the blue stew gets drained.

Unbanned: Top, DRS (now that blue is nerfed they can regain their rightful place in the format), Earthcraft, Survival, Frantic Search, Mind Twist, Yawgmoth's Bargain (none of them will see more than niche play), Zirda, Lurrus (with the new companion rules they're more than safe), Goblin Recruiter (give me a break with that lame 'tournament time' argument, first it's not that big a concern and second who the hell plays big tournaments nowadays)

Maybe unbanned: Library of Alexandria, Memory Jar, Wheel of Fortune, Time Twister, Fastbond (they're not as good as you thought they were 15 years ago), Mox Pearl (who the fuck plays white anyway lmao), Bazaar of Bagdad (absolutely broken but fun as hell. if you get to keep brainstorm I want my Bazaar)

While we're at it, and since this is all pure fantasy we might just keep on dreaming, there will be new printings that punish people for being so damn greedy all the time:

Duosphere (like Trinisphere but costs 2 and makes everything costs at least 2)
Unisphere (ditto but with 1)
Magus of the Trinisphere (same exact text as trinisphere but also a 3/3 for 2W)
Magus of the Duosphere (you guessed it)
Magus of the Unisphere (ditto)
Magus of the Chalice (a 0/1 for XX with X counters on it, whenever a player casts a spell blah blah blah)

Also, and this should go without saying, the reserve list gets thoroughly abolished and reprinted to hell, even the non-competitive cards like Pyramids. Use Robinhood or Kraken like a normal person for your nerd speculation purposes.

That's pretty much it. Fuck Legacy and fuck WotC.

[PirateKing]

Fine then. Let's ban Valki so

You don't need to ban Valki, they just need to update the rules in line with what they already did with Cascade.
You used to be able to cascade a Shardless Agent into Bust because Boom is CMC 2.

The design space is the same, for all they talk up about streamlining rules to coincide with players expectations, this is just flagrant.
Either that, or go back to letting me Imprint Research onto my Isochron Scepter and casting Development every turn.
If one is okay, then both should be. Saying one is unintuitive might have merit, but be consistent for fuck's sake.

[Ronald Deuce]

Duosphere (like Trinisphere but costs 2 and makes everything costs at least 2)
Unisphere (ditto but with 1)
Magus of the Trinisphere (same exact text as trinisphere but also a 3/3 for 2W)
Magus of the Duosphere (you guessed it)
Magus of the Unisphere (ditto)
Magus of the Chalice (a 0/1 for XX with X counters on it, whenever a player casts a spell blah blah blah)

Your bias is showing.

If you want to beat up on blue, just play Dredge.

"BUT IT FLODS TO HAET!" I don't care. That hate has a specific function and it serves a specific purpose admirably. You just want Legacy to be a one-deck format, only it's gotta be YOUR deck.

EDIT: Also, most of those cards wouldn't even do anything. What's the point in changing things around if it doesn't matter?

[Fox]

That is quite the suggested banlist. Since you play a deck that doesn't have its origins in entirely old-bordered cards let me help you understand the only things that have ever mattered in legacy for any length of time:
1- Tarmogoyf until the printing of SCM
2- total hand destruction (Hymn with Shardless or SCM, Counterbalance, and Grixis Delver with Probe/Therapy)
3- Oko

^this is the comprehensive story of legacy, with short interruptions from cards like Misstep, Cruise, Dig, Wrenn, Breach, Lurrus. Once Oko is banned, we will be adding Echo to the list of total hand destruction.

SnT and its dudes don't matter. They are combo control, and the more of them you see, the less likely you are to get Belcher'd to oblivion. No matter how much you hate losing to the sheer stupidity of SnT, they are your allies. If you ever want to play grindy magic, you need combo control to lay down the law, more than any other archetype.

You have correctly identified Oko as a card that needs to be banned. The one and only job the AggroLoamers & Chalice bros of the world need to perform is to troll Delver decks, and be able to Chalice-troll design mistakes like Dreadhorde for the rest of us. Also you guys are allowed to try and derp wins off of SB Leyline spam.

The job of the Maverick-types is again to spam the Leyline cheese and try and derp people out with hatebears. Unfortunately they banned DRS instead of Hymn, ensuring you would never stand a chance against Grixis control which is now called 4c SnowOko, so the rest of the format can't count on you guys to police GYs effectively.

Now to all the Maverick and Loamers out there, just so you're aware, your deck is just a cheap knock-off of RG Lands b/c of your insufferable need to play KotR. Shut the eff up about TNN, you're playing a KNIGHT WITHOUT FLANKING.

[chunderbucket]

Your bias is showing.



I can see you're quite the astute detective, detecting my bias despite my best attempts to be absolutely impartial and dispassionate.


If you want to beat up on blue, just play Dredge.

"BUT IT FLODS TO HAET!" I don't care. That hate has a specific function and it serves a specific purpose admirably. You just want Legacy to be a one-deck format, only it's gotta be YOUR deck.

I don't see how it transpires that I want to play only one deck, let alone what deck I play. On the contrary, I deplore the wealth and diversity of competitive decks that existed prior to WotC giving the already-best color of magic a bunch of broken printings.



EDIT: Also, most of those cards wouldn't even do anything. What's the point in changing things around if it doesn't matter?

I'm not sure how you can readily conclude how a meta might shake out with a bunch of hypothetical bannings and imaginary printings. If you think you're this good at predicting things you should save yourself the trouble of arguing on a nerd forum and buy out the next Gamestop stock or whatever.

To Fox: I have no idea how you got the idea that I play Maverick, or even what deck I play at all. It's not really about the deck I play but the decks I encounter. Seeing Delver all the damn time for 10 years, like a giant and enduring middle finger to the color pie was already tiring enough, but Oko and Uro are just too much even after 1 year. I don't care what decks are playable so long as I don't have to see the same goodstuff piles round after round.

I also don't get why you're telling me about the history of Legacy since I'm not trying to extrapolate the future from the past, I'm indulging in my fantasy on a dying forum as a therapeutic device to cope with the fact that the format is ruined, WotC keeps screwing up and paper magic is dead anyway. Instead of having improductive debates that lead to nowhere you should indulge yourself as well and post your ideal banlist/format, I'm curious to see it.

[Fox]

You can't go off on cards like Grisel and Emmy and TNN and also be mostly concerned by goodstuff piles. Let's take on TNN really quickly - this card is made to stop people from goodstuff durdling. The issue is that TNN deals 3 and Oko/Uro gain 3 per turn. If you don't like goodstuff, you don't actually have any problems with TNN - it's on your side.

[BirdsOfParadise]

My premise in thinking about the banned list is that it's a bad thing when the questions "What's the best card?" and "What's the best color?" have obvious answers.

I don't think this premise is shared by nearly as many players as I once thought.

[Wrath of Pie]

Ponder, Preordain (we'll let you keep brainstorm because we know you can't get an erection without it but the other cantrips absolutely have to go)
You missed Serum Visions and Portent.

[phonics]

Talking about what should and shouldn't be banned doesn't really matter when the design paradigm of legacy essentially forces any new cards to be borderline bannable if they want to see any real play, since at least half the meta is already playing with "cards that should be banned". When there is such an advantage in interaction it makes sense that the only other axis decks can compete with is less-interactive in either solitaire or prison styles, with most new "playables" emphasizing this distinction or just getting banned outright for pushing it too far.

[chunderbucket]

You see, what I liked in Legacy was the quirky interactions whereby two or more bad-to-middling cards suddenly became broken when taken together. Infernal Tutor + LED, Dredge cards + Ichorid and Narcomoeba, Aluren + Parasitic Strix, Painter + Grindstone, etc. Hell, even the dumb Eldrazi + a fragile sol land manabase qualify. It didn't really matter to me whether the quirky deck is interactive or prison or solitaire or aggro, as long as it was unique. It also meant each deck had a specific angle of attack and specific weaknesses, which meant in turn that you could attempt to disrupt a number of those strategies by coming up with your own. Eventually, on the eve of a tournament, a large number of people would attempt to second-guess each other on the many possible strategies and the means to disrupt them in a myriad of different ways, an intellectually and psychologically interesting thought process also known as metagaming.

But repeatedly Wizards has shown that they dislike this approach to 'quirky' game design because it's often combo-ish and 'combo feels bad'. It's also much harder to design cards such that they are balanced alone but very strong when paired with another balanced card. It also sells less, because it's not always obvious which interactions go well together and how strong it is. So instead they design cards that just do value on their own, one card combos. And more and more, the quirky and original cards give way to the goodstuff. Why go to such lengths to do some contrived synergies when you can just slam value card after value card until your opponent concedes?

So yes, the current paradigm is that Wizards will keep pushing dumb card after dumb card so the meta becomes obsolete every year or so. The previous paradigm, when the cards that made it into Legacy occupied a sort of niche that competed with the others instead of taking over, this is what I miss.


You missed Serum Visions and Portent.

Nah it's ok, I want to imagine a blue mage's face contort into disgust under their N95 mask as they resort to flashing back Serum Visions with DHA.

[Reeplcheep]

In a format with brainstorm and force of will, banning things purely on power level has already been thrown out the window.

Effects on the meta and gameplay have to be considerations as well.

[Wrath of Pie]

Nah it's ok, I want to imagine a blue mage's face contort into disgust under their N95 mask as they resort to flashing back Serum Visions with DHA.
I have bad news for you.

[Ronald Deuce]

I can see you're quite the astute detective, detecting my bias despite my best attempts to be absolutely impartial and dispassionate.

Then don't waste our time. Chalice of the Void does enough of that without you.

[Lord Seth]

I don't think that they're going to ban Valki. If they do anything about, they'll just change how Cascade works (because casting a 7 mana walker from a cmc 2 cascasde is fucking stupid to begin with). Not that they would do it right away, as there's still money to be made from Valki.
To be honest I'm kind of surprised they didn't have Cascade only cast the side with the lower mana cost to begin with. They changed the way the split cards worked so you couldn't pull off that cascade trick anymore, so it's really odd to me they didn't have that as the way these worked from the get-go.

[pettdan]

Been waiting for this since about January last year, finally! Hopefully. There's a b&r announcement planned for Monday. https://twitter.com/mtgoverhaul/status/1360359867068907525?s=21

[BirdsOfParadise]

https://twitter.com/itsJulian23/status/1360801389291659268/photo/1

Let's just remember that RUG Delver and Turbo Tibalt and Snowko are all completely different decks. It wouldn't be valid to just lump them together and then compute the percentage of "Oko decks." Even if the best Legacy deck always happens to be some kind of deck containing Oko, it's all right because the second-best and third-best Legacy decks will be different decks containing Oko.

Don't even get me started on how Oko is doing us a favor by policing the format.

[pettdan]

Yes, I always thought strategic diversity is a poor man's diversity, you illustrate it well.

[Mr. Safety]

My predictions:

Legacy - Oko banned, due to format homogenization

Legacy will be discussed with a 'watchlist', probably emphasizing Arcum's Astrolabe and Uro.

All formats - cascade mechanic 'fixed'

[chunderbucket]

So they axed Oko, Astrolabe and DHA. Too bad Uro stayed in (and also Delver but what was I thinking), but maybe the format is playable again

[Barook]

New bans (https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/news/february-15-2021-banned-and-restricted-announcement?DeleteUroDay)

Apparently people have found a workaround to access the article. Looks like Oko, DHA and Astrolabe are gone and Cascade gets a rule change. If that's the case, that's a pretty satisfying ban round. We'll definitely see more Uro bullshit due to this in the future, but oh well.

[Reeplcheep]

http://https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/news/february-15-2021-banned-and-restricted-announcement?x=iazoidrnet

They actually fucking did it. Oko, DHA, cascade, and even labe.

If they fucked this up I was quitting for good. I might actually buy a paper deck now. Anyone got cheap cities?

[Reeplcheep]

I think uro will remain very strong (see stryfo pile) but I don’t think it will be bannable.

If you either have to give up pyroblast or wasteland immunity to play it then I think it’s cost comes at a sufficient downside.

My guess at top decks is Bant snow without red, Grixis Delver and doomsday for top dogs. Naya lands (Pfire back baby), and chalice decks seem quite strengthened. D&t and Mavericks blue matchups become really good but current combo mus (doomsday/omni/oops) seem real bad still.

Delver will still run outs to chalice (borrower/kcommand) but that makes them weaker vs combo, fair non-blue and control than oko.

[chunderbucket]

My guess is that the new meta is probably going to coalesce into Delver on the aggressive side and Uro on the control side. Narset and Teferi are also going to see a resurgence when everyone realizes they're dumb cmc3 planeswalkers as well

[FTW]

They actually banned Snowko, UGH Delver, and Turbo Tibalt all at once. What will people even play in tournaments? Fair decks? Doomsday?

[Barook]

They actually banned Snowko, UGH Delver, and Turbo Tibalt all at once. What will people even play in tournaments? Fair decks? Doomsday?
Delver never gets banned until they dismantle the core, aka banning Delver and some of the cantrip base (not going to happen). Just wait for the next card that slots into UX Delver for the whole bullshit to repeat again.

[BKclassic]

I gotta think True-Name is going to be a big winner. Hard to picture what the metagame is going to look like tho, a lot of fringe strategies have gotten a lot more powerful over the years but were being held down by Oko and the like... Ruby Storm, Merfolk w/ Paradigm Shift, Curses and other some such. Probably a more combo intensive format.

[pettdan]

Must say I love this ban, all of it, exactly what I wished for. Thanks Wizards! Good to see they listen to the community.

[chunderbucket]

Delver never gets banned until they dismantle the core, aka banning Delver and some of the cantrip base (not going to happen). Just wait for the next card that slots into UX Delver for the whole bullshit to repeat again.

They could ban Delver and TNN. Force blue to splash to get good creatures. It stays the best color (because of cantrips and the monopoly on countermagic) but it doesn't eat up the whole color pie, so that's fair in a way. The issue is that people really like their delvers so the tactic of 'bitching until wotc relents' won't work no matter how ridiculous the card is.

[Fox]

They could ban Delver and TNN. Force blue to splash to get good creatures. It stays the best color (because of cantrips and the monopoly on countermagic) but it doesn't eat up the whole color pie, so that's fair in a way. The issue is that people really like their delvers so the tactic of 'bitching until wotc relents' won't work no matter how ridiculous the card is.

Yes, when blue decks splashed for DRS everyone was happy.

[FTW]

Delver never gets banned until they dismantle the core, aka banning Delver and some of the cantrip base (not going to happen). Just wait for the next card that slots into UX Delver for the whole bullshit to repeat again.

They didn't ban RUG Delver or UR Delver or RUB Delver.

They banned UGH Delver = Delver overpowered with Oko and DHA. Now it's just regular RUG Delver again, which was a 50/50 deck but not overpowered.

[chunderbucket]

Yes, when blue decks splashed for DRS everyone was happy.

But legacy was a thing before DRS and it isn't in the format anymore? What's your point?

[Fox]

But legacy was a thing before DRS and it isn't in the format anymore? What's your point?

So you just want to play pre-Innistrad, just do that then.

[Barook]

They didn't ban RUG Delver or UR Delver or RUB Delver.

They banned UGH Delver = Delver overpowered with Oko and DHA. Now it's just regular RUG Delver again, which was a 50/50 deck but not overpowered.
You're missing my point. Some Delver variant WILL be overpowered again in the future due a new card that tips the scale. They're merely treating the symptoms with each ban, not the cause. Similiar how they restrict pretty much everything in Vintage Workshop because they don't want to ban the root of the problem, Workshop.

[Ronald Deuce]

Can they just . . . NOT ban three cards at a time and go back to the old mulligan rule? That would fix a lot of things.

[Mr. Safety]

This was a good set of decisions, if only to promote an intense shakeup that will make diversity increase. I think a card that gets a fairly big boost is Stoneforge Mystic. With DHA being the premier 2-drop threat Stoneforge was really squashed out of the format. I think we'll see more Batterskulls in the near future. Narset and Teferi will see more play, I'm not sure about big daddy Jace.

[FTW]

I think Wizards has long given up on whether some Xerox variant will be overpowered again. This is the format for players who want to play Xerox, so it can be safely cut out of all the other formats. Banning the new offenders is easier to justify on the secondary market because those cards get banned from Modern and Pioneer too, so they're expected to tank in price as part of Wizards new business model.

Snow-Covered Forest should see about 90% less play, which is good, because I am sick of seeing that card.

Veil of Summer numbers should go down (blue decks have REB and Mystical and Fluster without splashing), at least until players remember that Hymn to Tourach is a magic card.

[pettdan]

Some cards that benefit:
Chalice
Blood moon
Choke
Auriok salvagers
Aether vial
Stoneforge mystic + equipment
Bitterblossom
Liliana otv & otlh
Misthollow griffin?
Knight of the reliquary
Wasteland
Basics
Palace Jailer
Thought-Knot Seer
Reality Smasher
Thopter Foundry
Mystic Forge

Late edit:
Jace, the Mindsculptor
Urza, Lord High Artificer
Snapcaster Mage

[Ronald Deuce]

I guess the good news is that we'll all get to keep losing to Delvers.

[Mr Miagi]

Good bans all around. Personally I will miss the astro lab in 3-4 color controls, maybe they could give it some more time to see if the card was really that busted. But hey, at least wasteland is a thing again.. everyone rejoice :really:

[Wanderlust]

I'm strongly in the "rejoice!" camp. Great bans, each and every one. The mistakes of 2019 continue to be undone! Also, can we take snow-covered lands out of our non-Snow decks now? With labe around we had to play them to represent snoko to be playing optimally, but I think that may be behind us now.

[mistercakes]

Some cards that benefit:
Chalice
Blood moon
Choke
Auriok salvagers
Aether vial
Stoneforge mystic + equipment
Bitterblossom
Liliana otv & otlh
Misthollow griffin?
Knight of the reliquary
Wasteland
Basics
Palace Jailer
Thought-Knot Seer
Reality Smasher
Thopter Foundry
Mystic Forge

i think you mean every single creature that didn't have a come into play effect, and some that did. also every useful artifact that didn't end the game on the spot.

[Barook]

This was a good set of decisions, if only to promote an intense shakeup that will make diversity increase. I think a card that gets a fairly big boost is Stoneforge Mystic. With DHA being the premier 2-drop threat Stoneforge was really squashed out of the format. I think we'll see more Batterskulls in the near future. Narset and Teferi will see more play, I'm not sure about big daddy Jace.
SFM mainly benefits because now equipments have a chance to live for more than one turn again without becoming an Elk.

[Reeplcheep]

No oko & no labe probably mean less coatls and no hasty elks. Is it possible the courts should be a major beneficiary?

[FTW]

No oko & no labe probably mean less coatls and no hasty elks. Is it possible the courts should be a major beneficiary?

Tough to say. Courts looked appealing partly because Oko nullified fair nonenchantment strategies (creatures, artifacts, PWs). Court both got around that and benefited from the fewer fair creatures to steal Monarch. I expect the fringe enchantment-based control decks to weaken a bit as regular good stuff becomes playable again, they were sort of capitalizing on a quirk of the meta. I'm taking apart UW RipHelm for now.

You can still play Court in UWx control, but those decks now want to be running more cards like Teferi, Narset, Jace, Monastery Mentor, Snapcaster Mage, Stoneforge Mystic, Hullbreacher... Meanwhile there will be more random Mavericks, D&T, Stoneblade, Goblins, Merfolk, etc to take your Monarch token.

[pettdan]

i think you mean every single creature that didn't have a come into play effect, and some that did. also every useful artifact that didn't end the game on the spot.

Yeah, pretty much.

[Pittplayer]

I would rather have seen an Uro/Oko ban than this. But yeah, so long Oko!

[Ronald Deuce]

Also, can we take snow-covered lands out of our non-Snow decks now? With labe around we had to play them to represent snoko to be playing optimally, but I think that may be behind us now.

No, the optimal play was to run regular basics so that your opponent thought you were Bad at Maygick.

[BirdsOfParadise]

No, the optimal play was to run regular basics so that your opponent thought you were Bad at Maygick.
Shuffling your deck, letting it fall to the floor face-down, letting a Sacred Foundry fall out of your sleeve face-up, then saying sorry and picking up your deck and palming the Sacred Foundry back into your sleeve, never to be used again in that match --- legal or illegal?

[FTW]

Shuffling your deck, letting it fall to the floor face-down, letting a Sacred Foundry fall out of your sleeve face-up, then saying sorry and picking up your deck and palming the Sacred Foundry back into your sleeve, never to be used again in that match --- legal or illegal?

Tech is accidentally revealing Stomping Ground, shuffling back up, presenting deck to opponent, then saying "oh no.... is that my Modern deck? I should stop using the same sleeves for all my decks". Opponent scoffs, expecting an easy win. Then you turn 1 Goblin Charbelcher. (there is practically 0 risk to running 1 Stomping Ground over 1 Taiga in Belcher, so you don't give up win% to maximize troll%)

[Ronald Deuce]

Anyway, aren't bans supposed to be the worst thing that can happen to a game? All the rejoicing around here over mediocre three-drops' and alternative-to-thousand-dollar-lands one-drops' getting the axe feels pretty contemptible in all sincerity.

[pettdan]

In my experience, bans are closer to the best thing that can happen to a game.

If we want to sort this out, the reason that a ban is needed is the bad thing, but once it's needed, the ban rids us of the problem. It could be likened to a punishment. Going to jail seems like a very bad thing, but the really bad thing was the crime that led to the punishment and for the rest of the world, the criminal being locked away is a good thing. Now I have a forgiving view on humans that commit crimes, depending on the crimes, but that's a different story and not so relevant for this analogy.

[Reeplcheep]

After so many fuckups in the last 2 years, this is the biggest thing WOTC has done to improve play patterns, increase meta diversity, and lower power levels. People should sincerely be happy.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

After so many fuckups in the last 2 years, this is the biggest thing WOTC has done to improve play patterns, increase meta diversity, and lower power levels. People should sincerely be happy.

These are the direct results of those fuckups

[Ronald Deuce]

It could be likened to a punishment. Going to jail seems like a very bad thing, but the really bad thing was the crime that led to the punishment and for the rest of the world, the criminal being locked away is a good thing. Now I have a forgiving view on humans that commit crimes, depending on the crimes, but that's a different story and not so relevant for this analogy.

Assuming retributive justice is good (your equation of it with the prison system, which was created [for better or, probably, worse] for the sake of rehabilitating criminals, notwithstanding), who's getting punished?

Players are getting punished, not the people who designed the "problematic" cards.

[pettdan]

Wizards will make design mistakes, it's inevitable, they can't test properly for Legacy, as long as they act swiftly damage is minimised. In my view, the only problem here is that they take too long to act.

In the analogue with crime, I was actually considering Oko to be the criminal, being out in the society (=format) committing crimes and being locked up with the ban announcement. It could be interpreted that WotC were committing the crime when designing the cards, I didn't intend that as the analogue though because I think, like described just above, that Wizards actually don't intend to design for older formats, not to 100%, they probably try to but can't justify spending resources on it that would be needed, so I don't really blame wizards for that personally. Edit: that analogue needed some further tweaking. It's ironic because I'm just reading about how to use analogues for scientific purposes.

[Fallen_Empire]

basics are back baby! glad astrolabe is gone and contamination is playable again!