Is Legacy too broken?

[Bill Stark]

Recently we published an article by Ari Lax about whether or not Legacy is too broken (http://www.thestarkingtonpost.com/articles/-/Fixing_Legacy). He claimed it was following Grand Prix-Columbus.

In the spirit of fairness, today we published an exhaustively researched article by David Gleicher arguing the opposite (http://www.thestarkingtonpost.com/articles/-/What_Broken_Formats_Really_Look_Like). He analyzes the five most degenerate formats of all time and compares them to the modern world of Legacy.

His conclusion is that modern Legacy is actually one of the BETTER formats, and I believe I'm inclined to agree with him. The point of this post is to ask whether entrenched Legacy players agree with him or with Ari.

[Cthuloo]

Interesting article, good analysis and research and well drawn conclusions (that find me in agreement). I really liked the idea of looking back to old mistakes and see if today's situation looks similar or not.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

This almost feels like a setup. The only part I really disagree with is his assessment of Hulk-Flash era Legacy (if we can call a month an era). For a deck to show up in an Eternal format after only existing for a month and fight through a field of pure, dedicated hate decks to still dominate the tournament is a pretty disproportionate show of strength. Especially given how expensive the deck was to build, and how many people who actually owned the cards were trying to play the hate instead. Even then you had at least 5-10 slots open to run various anti-hate cards maindeck. It was basically the Raffinity situation with the pro that the Flash-hate cards weren't entirely useless against other decks, but the con that that hate decks still didn't win very consistently against a wide range of Flash builds. But he admits to not having played during this (very brief) period in time, so it's perfectly understandable to underestimate how overpowered the combo was.

I don't think Legacy is broken right now fundamentally, except possibly in the cost range. The only things I think would make the format more interesting by being banned would be Goyf or Tendrils of Agony, but neither of those is overbearing enough a presence to make the format unhealthy; they're closer to superficial blemishes.

[pippo84]

I didn't play back in the days of Flash, Trix etc, but read about them and listended to players that did.

I have to say that I like Legacy pre and post MT ban. I don't think that the format is broken, it's in evolution all the time. And this means it's a healthy format. Looking at the results from GP Columbus you can see it, but also looking at the results from smaller tournaments you can notice it.

+1 to Legacy!

[Amon Amarth]

This almost feels like a setup. The only part I really disagree with is his assessment of Hulk-Flash era Legacy (if we can call a month an era). For a deck to show up in an Eternal format after only existing for a month and fight through a field of pure, dedicated hate decks to still dominate the tournament is a pretty disproportionate show of strength.

QFT. This was my only criticism of the article. He really downplayed Flashes impact on that Legacy. That deck was just... it was like playing Vintage without a Restricted List. Other than that it was a good article for them young'ins to learn from us ole timas. Back in my day we killed on turn 2 with Fow Daze and Duress back up on the same turn!

[Sharpened]

QFT. This was my only criticism of the article. He really downplayed Flashes impact on that Legacy. That deck was just... it was like playing Vintage without a Restricted List. Other than that it was a good article for them young'ins to learn from us ole timas. Back in my day we killed on turn 2 with Fow Daze and Duress back up on the same turn!

He downplays Flash's impact on Legacy becuase its hard to paint a clear picture of it. The deck existed for all of what, 2 months? Compare it to the other examples, and you can see it's not so much about the powerlevel of the decks, but their affects on the format. The way Flash affected the format is hard to talk about, becuase given the amount of time available, the format had barely begun to react. When comparing with decks like Trix thats survived multiple rounds of banning, or decks like Tinker, which dominated for so long, and the formated needed all its dangerous cards banned once the big dog was removed, there's very little you can say about Flash-era Legacy.

[caiomarcos]

When I read the thread subject "Is Legacy too broken?" I shouted to myself Hell no! In only a few seconds I could recall half a dozen formats and eras that were way, way, WAY more broken then what Legacy is now. Then I read the thread and realized that that's what the author did.

Pretty much everything pre-invasion was broken for today standards. Maybe they wouldn't be broken in today's field, but when decks like Parallax-Replenish battle decks with Vampiric Tutor, Yawg's Will AND Yawg's Bargain and win, I call it broken. If I'm not mistaken, no immediate actions were taken at that time, the format just rotated out.

I still didn't read the article itself, but the obvious answer is obvious. Legacy is today probably the most balanced and diverse format I've ever seen. Many eras of T2 are balanced but then the diversity is very little only because of the own nature of the format. In my opinion Legacy is even better now with the last banning of Mystical. Combos are still available, doing well but are not over the top. ANT with Mystical was a little too much.

[Iranon]

Legacy has exactly the right level of brokenness: Abominations that make me giggle as a deckbuilder are an option... and they aren't even on the radar.

Combo decks that can kill on turn 1 half the time? Monstrously powerful Prison decks that can lock an opponent out on turn 1 a good part of the time? Ironfisted control that will eat your soul?
All possible. But the decks that put up numbers play very, very fair in comparison.

[CorpT]

I think it helps that David Gleicher is a really nice guy and good player while Ari seems like a pompous ass. I say that not because I happen to agree with David, but because his article is well thought out, well researched and well written while Ari's is... not.

[caenel]

Im surprised the author did not mention Megrim Jar as an example for an overpowered deck that required bannings.

Granted, Megrim Jar decks did not get that many top end finishes (in standard or extended), but that was just because they absolutely had to ban Memory Jar about a month after releasing it, since this deck was just over the top.
Here's an old SSG article on that matter: http://www.starcitygames.com/php/news/print.php?Article=10023

If I know of any deck that I think of as overpowered, Megrim Jar is on top of my list. A 2 card combo, backup up by all the best accelleration in the game (Dark Ritual, Mana Vault, Grim Monolith, Voltaic Key (technically accelleration with the afformentioned two), Lotus Petal, Mox Diamond, Tolarian Academy). And that's just the acceleration Standard had to offer.
I and a couple of friends played this deck in about 2 tournaments (Standard) during the short period it was legal, and it was just nuts.

And because of blue bounce and Duress it could get through all kinds of hate without even blinking.

I might be wrong, but a deck that requires 'emergency bannings' to level the playing field again sure is my broken deck of the day.

[Smmenen]

how can an article talk about brokeness, but not mention Vintage periods :p

[Finn]

I think he was simply giving examples that he was familiar with. He did not need to list them all to be effective, which the article is. But I think the author got a bit tied up in his own (wonderful) research, and lost track of his point somewhere along the way.

David, if you are reading this thread, I would have liked to see you connect the dots more clearly with at minimum another whole paragraph on the whys and wherefors that point toward your conclusion that THOSE were broken periods and THIS is not. It is kind of a complicated subject, and you have a wide range of levels of knowledge amongst readers.

Thanks for the insight. Good read.

[ktkenshinx]

As some of you might know, I appreciate the theoretical and researched approach to format evaluation. Magic formats/bannings/archetype construction/etc. would be greatly benefited by a social scientist's approach. In that spirit, I appreciate David's article. It is fairly well-argued with decent supporting evidence, and I generally agree with what he is saying.

Then there is Ari Lax. His article, and the arguments used in it, are like the Nourishing List decklist; they are fun, attractive, but at their core, just a pile. I am not going to start with his ridiculous claims for card bannings, because we can only understand them as ridiculous in light of one of his assumptions. Lax builds his article on top of this one assumption, and it is this dependence that sends his writing into a downward slide.

People don’t seem to understand this, but combo is the best archetype in Legacy and it isn’t even close. The only things holding it back are a resistance to playing it, poor builds that lose to fair interactions like Wasteland, and poor play. At GP Columbus last weekend I played Storm, and I didn’t lose a single game to a fair deck that wasn’t my fault. The hate isn’t strong enough and the viable combo decks are too varied to beat them all without your own degenerate lock or combo.
As far as fundamental assumptions go, this one is a really bad one. It is rare that assumptions are both theoretically AND empirically wrong; most assumptions at least sound good before they get rigorously evaluated (check out any state or federal gun laws, for instance). This one fails on both levels.

Lax says "The only things holding it back are a resistance to playing it, poor builds that lose to fair interactions like Wasteland, and poor play." Let's assume this is true. What would that mean for Legacy players? It would mean that Legacy players simply don't want to play combo, that they chronically construct "poor builds", and that they always engage in "poor play." Basically, it boils down to this: Legacy players are lazy and dumb. Only such a player would not put the requisite time into learning combo, pick up an untested build, or just avoid an archetype altogether.

This is outrageously improbable. There must be thousands of Legacy players in the world, with hundreds of events throughout the year. If deckcheck.net is any indication, there are dozens of tournaments every week alone. Are we to believe that all of these players are just too incapable to properly pilot combo, and that every tournament in which combo comes up short was just plagued with noobs? That's a ridiculous idea.

Just look at GP Columbus. If combo was half as nuts as Lax insinuates, then why did the Top 8 not mirror the disastrous breakdown of Columbus in 2007 (the Flash Hulk fiasco)? The same goes for GP Madrid months earlier. Over a thousand players, and only 2 ANT/1 Reanimator in the top 8. Were all those hundreds of other players just too stupid, lazy, or oblivious to play the obviously best archetype in the format?

We have to assume that Legacy players want to win. If they want to win, they are going to pick what they perceive as the winning strategy. If combo is the most winning strategy, then they will overwhelmingly play it, and they will dominate. History has shown that this is the case with TRULY dominate archetypes (Flash Hulk, Tinker, Faeries, Affinity, etc.). Yet, in all the major events of the last year, this has not happened (despite Wizards' claims that MT deserved the banhammer).

Thus, the evidence and the psychology is against Lax's article. The raw data shows that combo does not dominate, and if we are to reasonably believe that Legacy players are pretty smart and capable of dedication and testing, then why are they not committing themselves to combo? The answer is simple: combo is not as out of control as Lax believes.

As to Lax's ban suggestions, he essentially reveals that he just does not like ANYTHING in the current Legacy format. Reanimator? Too ghastly. Aggro Loam? Too brutal. Storm? Too speedy. CounterTop? Too controlling. Zoo? Too aggressive. And look at that; there goes most of the solid decks in the format! Lax even goes so far as to contradict himself, blasting Legacy players for being complacent in innovation, but then calling for the banning of Survival of the Fittest, a card that has only recently enjoyed serious success and deck development (moreso than usual, that is).

I have nothing personal against Lax, and I enjoy reading any article on Legacy and Magic. I commend him for writing something at all, and for stating an opinion that he believes. But the opinion itself is a bad one, lacking both evidence and grounding. His argument effectively boils down to "I don't like it so it's wrong". Compared to David's article, full of examples from past tournaments, Lax's writing really falls short.

-ktkenshinx-

[LordEvilTeaCup]

This article is more like it.

[majikal]

I approve of this article.

[dahcmai]

I played during all the formats including when standard wasn't even born yet and Vintage was just what you played at the time.

Flash was disgustingly good. A little over the top. sure we might have had some good hate for it eventually and it might have even balanced out, but I doubt it would have ever been an average pick.

Trix was bad, but way worse in Vintage.

Personally, I think Legacy is better than it's been in a long time. I remember when it was only a select few decks really took the top spots, now, it's open to all. If we can just keep people from messing with the banned/restricted list things will stay fairly balanced and we can go back to just coming up with new tech for each other.

[AriLax]

For what it is worth, I don't necessarily think Legacy is too broken for a format, aside from maybe LED and Entomb being legal. If I had to grind a PTQ season of the current Legacy format I would assume it would be about as good as the latest Extended format.

I think that Legacy is too broken for a format that is supported in the manner that it is and with the issues it currently faces regarding card access however.

[dontbiteitholmes]

how can an article talk about brokeness, but not mention Vintage periods :p

He specifically mentions he doesn't know much about Vintage. On a related note, when Academy was the best deck (pre-bannings) it was by far one of the most unbeatable decks I've ever played against, in any format, ever. Vintage has gone through so many phases where one card or deck defines the format, it's really hard to keep track. Where was "Combo Winter" though, it seems like peoples go to story on broken formats. I approve of this article either way.

[dahcmai]

Vintage Academy was unbeatable. That deck was unreal. I remember only two of us managed to make a deck when academy came out and it wasn't exactly hard to figure out what went in it to make it busted beyond reason. That deck was fully capable of punching through 3 forces on turn 1 and still winning. Just not everyone owned 4 Candlelabra of Tawnos'. Flash had nothing on that monster. It was a good thing is got restricted into oblivion. I had to laugh when they restricted everything in the deck except for City of Brass in one fell swoop and then kept restricting things to make sure it never popped back up in another form.

[ktkenshinx]

For what it is worth, I don't necessarily think Legacy is too broken for a format, aside from maybe LED and Entomb being legal. If I had to grind a PTQ season of the current Legacy format I would assume it would be about as good as the latest Extended format.

I think that Legacy is too broken for a format that is supported in the manner that it is and with the issues it currently faces regarding card access however.

Card access is not an internal Legacy problem. Bannings and format decisions should not, and often are not, made around whether a card is not widely available. This is a problem that is external to the format. What do I mean by that? If card access and availability becomes a problem, then obviously the Legacy format is incapable of handling that without severely crippling itself. An external solution is needed. As I have said in past threads, that might open up the gates for a new format (Mercadian Masques onwards), but that is not Legacy. It does not supplant Legacy, it supplements it.

As to Entomb and LED, it would be foolish to ban these cards, or even discuss their banning, at this current juncture. Reanimator has been hamstrung by the MT banning, as the deck lost a lot of its consistency and resiliency without its 1 mana instant speed fix-all. Storm-based combo decks were not destroyed by MT's removal, but they have definitely felt it (TES excepted). LED exists only as part of the storm Infernal Tutor engine, or as part of Dredge builds. I have very little positive to say about Dredge's recent performance over the past few months, so that's not really a factor in LED's supposed degeneracy. As to its Infernal Tutor synergy, the combo decks that use this interaction are not out of control. Bryant Cook did not win that GP, and no other decks in that event even used the artifact. If a card is too powerful, it posts powerful results. If a card is worthy of being banned, it posts ban-worthy results. LED and Entomb do not fit into that category.

-ktkenshinx-

[freakish777]

A word on Legacy Flash:

As bad as Flash was at GP Columbus 2007, there was a month of Legacy after Columbus but before Flash was actually banned. And that shit was stupid beyond words thanks to Pact of Negation and Summoner's Pact becoming legal right after Columbus. Giving the deck 4 free tutors (for either Hulk or Elvish Spirit Guide so you could kill on turn 1), and 4 more free counterspells (without needing another blue card in hand) was absurd.

[dahcmai]

Funny you should say LED wasn't used in that event. Check the top 32. There was quite a few that just didn't make it, including a Dredge deck at 32nd place. I know the pilot personally so I know how he lost and it wasn't due to match ups. I was sad he didn't break top 8, he was so close. Would've been fun to see a dredge deck hit the top. Never discount things people don't prepare for. i could win the tournament handily with Affinity if no one brought a single Null rod or similar card. Those things happen.

[death]

Legacy isn't too broken right now after Mystical Tutor banning. Aside from Reanimator and ANT, I think the advent of Doomsday & Show and Tell decks pushed Mystical Tutor to its limits. If I were to speculate the cards in their watch list right now, those will be LED and SDT. But banning additional cards will most likely blow things out of proportion resulting to some archtypes being too overpowered for this format, an example is Survival of the Fittest and Zoo.

[Dark Ritual]

LED is needed in the format to keep the trifecta intact. Sure the card is pretty over the top with cantrips and tutors but you aren't guaranteed to have an LED in your hand every game with an infernal tutor or cantrip into ad nauseam/storm engine since you only have access to 4. Legacy is the most healthy, diverse format in magic right now. Nothing needs to get banned although there are some cards that can get unbanned like land tax and worldgorger dragon.

Flash is a ridiculously overpowered card in legacy and GP Columbus 1.0 proved it. The deck was so hard to beat and it was "I resolved flash, I guess I win" and you could play a deck designed to beat flash but that proves that it (flash) was warping the metagame to flash and decks designed to beat flash which is very unhealthy. And like freakish777 said, after the GP the deck got two more tools to abuse: summoner's pact and pact of negation, cards that clearly put the deck over the top since pact got the hulk and pact of negation was another protection spell with no drawbacks at 0 mana that required no other blue cards in hand like FoW does.

+1 to Legacy

[dontbiteitholmes]

Nothing needs to get banned although there are some cards that can get unbanned like land tax and worldgorger dragon.

Wait what? Worldgorger? No thanks dude, seriously. Worldgorger is a nightmare. The kicker is if they don't have the whole combo they can just reanimate Dragon to draw and force another game. Aside from Faerie Macabre, Leyline, and the loss of Bazaar the whole Dragon combo is still very strong. I mean Entomb has been unbanned, Pact of Negation has come out, Thoughtsieze, I just really hope I never have to play vs. that F'in Dragon ever again. One of the most unfun decks to play against ever.

[majikal]

Wait what? Worldgorger? No thanks dude, seriously. Worldgorger is a nightmare. The kicker is if they don't have the whole combo they can just reanimate Dragon to draw and force another game. Aside from Faerie Macabre, Leyline, and the loss of Bazaar the whole Dragon combo is still very strong. I mean Entomb has been unbanned, Pact of Negation has come out, Thoughtsieze, I just really hope I never have to play vs. that F'in Dragon ever again. One of the most unfun decks to play against ever.
This this this this this! Going to game 6 is never a good thing!

[MajinV]

Very well done article. For people who were graced with the fortune of not enduring such formats, this is a pretty informative analysis. Not everyone lived through the days of combo winter, the horrors of Raffinity, or just play extended (man, that format can be really silly, it seems) and this article provides a good example to those players as to what a truly unhealthy format looks like.

These days, the term "broken" is being used to the point where no one seems to realize its true meaning anymore. Skullclamp, Tinker, Yawgmoth's Will, Necropotence are "broken" cards; Bloodbraid Elf and Cryptic Command are very powerful (and former/current format staples), but nowhere near the level of the aforementioned cards.

[Mantis]

Flash is a ridiculously overpowered card in legacy and GP Columbus 1.0 proved it. The deck was so hard to beat and it was "I resolved flash, I guess I win" and you could play a deck designed to beat flash but that proves that it (flash) was warping the metagame to flash and decks designed to beat flash which is very unhealthy. And like freakish777 said, after the GP the deck got two more tools to abuse: summoner's pact and pact of negation, cards that clearly put the deck over the top since pact got the hulk and pact of negation was another protection spell with no drawbacks at 0 mana that required no other blue cards in hand like FoW does.
The same is true for combo, it's just that people are not playing it enough. The only deck you have any trouble at alll against is CB/Top, but solid combo players can attest that even this matchup is close to 50/50. The banning of Mystical Tutor stems the bleeding a lot and I think the deck is borderline acceptable right now, but if it were up to me I'd say give LED the axe.

This may be overkill in the eyes of some, but I truly hate combo in Legacy as there are 0 options to deal with the deck outside of a blue FoW deck. All of the other viable decks just lose to combo. That just makes no sense if you ask me. I know I should be playing combo to abuse the format but I enjoy other decks a lot more.

[Cabal_chan]

The same is true for combo, it's just that people are not playing it enough. The only deck you have any trouble at alll against is CB/Top, but solid combo players can attest that even this matchup is close to 50/50. The banning of Mystical Tutor stems the bleeding a lot and I think the deck is borderline acceptable right now, but if it were up to me I'd say give LED the axe.

This may be overkill in the eyes of some, but I truly hate combo in Legacy as there are 0 options to deal with the deck outside of a blue FoW deck. All of the other viable decks just lose to combo. That just makes no sense if you ask me. I know I should be playing combo to abuse the format but I enjoy other decks a lot more.

Some decks just have bad matchups. Some people seem to forget this, and think their deck should have good matchups against the entire field. I remember the whole hubbub over how Goblin Lackey was unfair, forced too many constraints on deck design, made so many deck strategies invalid yadda yadda yadda. Enough already.

[ktkenshinx]

This may be overkill in the eyes of some, but I truly hate combo in Legacy as there are 0 options to deal with the deck outside of a blue FoW deck. All of the other viable decks just lose to combo. That just makes no sense if you ask me. I know I should be playing combo to abuse the format but I enjoy other decks a lot more.

I apologize for calling you out on this, but your position is representative of many here. Just because you (the general/royal "you") do not enjoy playing against a deck, does not mean that the deck should be banned into extinction. Everyone in Legacy has their pet peeves in terms of opposing decks. I for one think that Tarmogoyf's consistency and sheer power level is just plain obnoxious. But I acknowledge that, at this point in Legacy, that does not at all merit a ban. Just take a look at recent top 8 finishes. Storm and LED-based combo decks are placing, but not nearly as much as we would expect if combo were just so damn good that it couldn't be stopped.

To all those who are using this moment in Legacy history to blast their least favorite archetype (which is most commonly combo): where on earth is your evidence? I happily provide the evidence to the contrary, as it appears to rule out all support in favor of your banning claims.

Looking at the deckcheck.net data on this, I queried "Lion's Eye Diamond" in the search bar, seeing how many decks used it in the maindeck since Mystical Tutor's demise. The answer? 19 decks. These decks start with "Next Ban Fetchland Tendrils" piloted by Dozio Fabio on July 4th, and end with 1 Land Belcher piloted by Jorge Vamala on August 15th. Here is the data below. I have renamed some decks to better show what archetype they were piloting ("Peter Show 4 President" is not a recognizable archetype)...

6: Next Ban Fetchland Tendrils
1: T2T - TES
1: Doomsday Combo
6: TES
5: DD-ANT
5: Red Nausea
2: The Epic Storm
7: TES
5: The Epic Storm
1: TES
4: DDFT
2: TES
3: WhiteBorderTES
7: ANT
7: TES
6: ANT
2: DDFT
8: DDFT
3: 1 Land Belcher
Average placement = 4.26

On average in this absurdly small sample size, a deck running LED got 4th place at their event. TES decks performed slightly better, averaging a 3.77 placement. Decks using Doomsday did the best, averaging a 3.33 placement. But this sample size is just too small to extrapolate much information from.

Well, except for the fact that combo is not out of control. If combo were indeed as nuts as people claimed, and LED/Tendrils/Infernal Tutor/Doomsday/Burning Wish were the big culprits, then this data would not look like this. Since July 1, there have been 30-40 decks running Counterbalance, Wild Nacatl, and Lord of Atlantis. Goblin Lackey appeared in almost as many decks as LED did (17 instead of 19), and averaged a solid 5th placement at tournaments (data here: http://www.deckcheck.net/list.php?main=Goblin+Lackey). Does that mean Lackey needs banning too? Decks that run Lord of Atlantis averaged a 3.5 placement at tournaments, and there were 32 of them (http://www.deckcheck.net/list.php?page=1&main=Lord+of+Atlantis). Does that mean that Lord of Atlantis needs banning too?

Player like/dislike of a card and its decks has zero bearing on whether or not it is overpowered. LED and its storm-friends do not have the problems associated with past format warpers from years past (Skullclamp? Tinker? Flash? Tolarian Academy? LED looks nothing like these monsters).

Again, I apologize for starting this off with Mantis's comment, as he is by no means the only person who holds that opinion, and he may have very legitimate reasons for offering it. But in general, opinions that are not supported with evidence are just that: opinions. Opinions do not direct Magic policy.

-ktkenshinx-

[Bahamuth]

I'm not advocating a bad on LED or anything. I enjoy palying with it way too much. But this site has been over this stuff before. In the current metagame and as a result of the randomness of Magic, anyone can or can't make top 8.
The reason storm combo is underperforming, is that people don't know how to play it. We saw that this is a general fact for the Legacy community around the time when Saito Top8'ed in Madrid. There was a sudden run on the deck. I remember there being two tournaments right after Madrid, one in Germany and one in America, where ANT was the most played deck. Yet none of these players did well.
I know that, under my own assumption, this information is not worth a lot, but it at least shows the run on ANT right after Madrid. The fact that no one is top8'ing with it, certainly doesn't mean the deck isn't broken. In fact, I still think the deck is broken, but with the ban, people lost interest and lists started becoming even harder to play. Not enough people seem to play storm combo and not enough people know how to do so. I don't have any evidence, I'm just giving my opinion.

[ummon]

I'm not advocating a bad on LED or anything. I enjoy palying with it way too much. But this site has been over this stuff before. In the current metagame and as a result of the randomness of Magic, anyone can or can't make top 8.
The reason storm combo is underperforming, is that people don't know how to play it. We saw that this is a general fact for the Legacy community around the time when Saito Top8'ed in Madrid. There was a sudden run on the deck. I remember there being two tournaments right after Madrid, one in Germany and one in America, where ANT was the most played deck. Yet none of these players did well.
I know that, under my own assumption, this information is not worth a lot, but it at least shows the run on ANT right after Madrid. The fact that no one is top8'ing with it, certainly doesn't mean the deck isn't broken. In fact, I still think the deck is broken, but with the ban, people lost interest and lists started becoming even harder to play. Not enough people seem to play storm combo and not enough people know how to do so. I don't have any evidence, I'm just giving my opinion.

I think everyone who think storm combo is still broken should just learn to play it well and prove that it is broken by winning tournaments with it. That would solve this problem of "It is my opinion". Certainly, one could argue that combo decks are non-interactive and thus no fun to play against so they should be weakened. But arguing that they are fundamentally overpowered is just stupid.

[ummon]

I'm not advocating a bad on LED or anything. I enjoy palying with it way too much. But this site has been over this stuff before. In the current metagame and as a result of the randomness of Magic, anyone can or can't make top 8.
The reason storm combo is underperforming, is that people don't know how to play it. We saw that this is a general fact for the Legacy community around the time when Saito Top8'ed in Madrid. There was a sudden run on the deck. I remember there being two tournaments right after Madrid, one in Germany and one in America, where ANT was the most played deck. Yet none of these players did well.
I know that, under my own assumption, this information is not worth a lot, but it at least shows the run on ANT right after Madrid. The fact that no one is top8'ing with it, certainly doesn't mean the deck isn't broken. In fact, I still think the deck is broken, but with the ban, people lost interest and lists started becoming even harder to play. Not enough people seem to play storm combo and not enough people know how to do so. I don't have any evidence, I'm just giving my opinion.

I think everyone who think storm combo is still broken should just learn to play it well and prove that it is broken by winning tournaments with it. That would solve this problem of "It is my opinion". Certainly, one could argue that combo decks are non-interactive and thus no fun to play against so they should be weakened. But arguing that they are fundamentally overpowered is just stupid.

[MMogg]

I think Gleicher hit the nail on the head regarding this discussion of the power of Storm versus pilots' potential to abuse it:


Truly broken formats do not require perfect play for a strategy to dominate. The natural power of that strategy will show in the results. When the results don’t show it, you should question whether that power is really there.

Let's face it, even the best storm pilots in the world don't consistently win tournaments with it, nor do they even top 8 every tournament they join.

[death]

Irrelevant. They don't consistently t8 simply because they are not the best period

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

The top 8 at Grand Prix Columbus only had 1 Tendrils deck. Of course, 6 of the other decks were Force of Will based, and the 8th ran Thoughtseize, Hymn, and Gerrard's Verdict with Duress in the board. The first Grand Prix Columbus actually had a smaller representation of disruption and combo since there was at least one honest-to-God aggro deck.

People might want to chill the fuck out about talking about how fair storm combo is. The fact that it doesn't use permanents makes the deck sort of fundamentally unfair compared to most traditional combo. More cards will eventually have to be banned to keep it in check unless they finally nuke the main culprit of Tendrils.

[walkerdog]

Wait what? Worldgorger? No thanks dude, seriously. Worldgorger is a nightmare. The kicker is if they don't have the whole combo they can just reanimate Dragon to draw and force another game. Aside from Faerie Macabre, Leyline, and the loss of Bazaar the whole Dragon combo is still very strong. I mean Entomb has been unbanned, Pact of Negation has come out, Thoughtsieze, I just really hope I never have to play vs. that F'in Dragon ever again. One of the most unfun decks to play against ever.

The dragon is garbage now. All of the cards you list are legal in Classic and the deck has no results. Dragon was nuts before the printing of the cards you mentioned along with Extirpate, the reprinting of Crypt, relic, and other semi-relevant cards. People PLAY GY HATE NOW. You pretty much are required too at this point, and people have responded. The combo loses to those cards, removal on dragon, the new White leyline (unless they manage to find a bounce spell also, which is possible), stifle, any bounce you choose to name, and so forth. The environment now is much harsher, and dragon would put up very weak results.

[dontbiteitholmes]

The top 8 at Grand Prix Columbus only had 1 Tendrils deck. Of course, 6 of the other decks were Force of Will based, and the 8th ran Thoughtseize, Hymn, and Gerrard's Verdict with Duress in the board. The first Grand Prix Columbus actually had a smaller representation of disruption and combo since there was at least one honest-to-God aggro deck.

People might want to chill the fuck out about talking about how fair storm combo is. The fact that it doesn't use permanents makes the deck sort of fundamentally unfair compared to most traditional combo. More cards will eventually have to be banned to keep it in check unless they finally nuke the main culprit of Tendrils.

Meh, the format is still not settled. The only thing the GP proved beyond a shadow of a doubt it that Merfolk is still a really good metagame deck and Force of Will is still strong. Sure combo rolls straight aggro, but playing combo w/o Mystical through 6-9 rounds is a seriously uphill battle. When you go to your next tournament count the number of Force of Wills at the top table after round 4 and tell me you would take combo over any other deck given that. I think banning M Tutor was the right move personally. It's a lot more fair for combo to have to play narrower answers to hate than 1x of every "I Win" Sorcery and Instant nukes in the sideboard. I also think the top 8 of the GP was somewhat of a fluke. I doubt we'll see some of those decks in a top 8 of a 100+ person tournament anytime soon, even now that they will be played by many more people. There were several aggro decks that missed the top 8 by a game, and if we replayed the last 2 rounds of the GP before the cut I think it's probable an aggro deck would make it. Really more than Storm being good, I think Firespout takes the blame for the lack of pure aggro in the top 8. There were so many Firespouts on top of that tournament and that's fairly new tech in the scene.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

When you go to your next tournament count the number of Force of Wills at the top table after round 4 and tell me you would take combo over any other deck given that.

I think you're missing the point. As Gleicher notes, based on the top 8's, the Raffinity environment wasn't broken; there was an acceptable diversity in archetypes by a historic standard. When you actually took those decks apart, however, they were all either Raffinity or a Red- or Green-based artifact-hate deck.

A Legacy metagame in which only discard, counterspells, and combo are viable is intrinsically unhealthy, even if combo is the weakest performing of those three. Tendrils combo alone can apply the pressure that keeps other decks from being viable while still being a worse choice than a Force-based deck.

That's not to say that we're not necessarily at that point. But people need to keep their finger on this. Casually assuming that Tendrils combo is fair and healthy for the format because it's not the top deck is foolish, and misses the point entirely.

[Grollub]

If anything Legacy isn't broken enough! We need combo to claim more victories instead of just a few top 8s here and there.

[MMogg]

I think you're missing the point. As Gleicher notes, based on the top 8's, the Raffinity environment wasn't broken; there was an acceptable diversity in archetypes by a historic standard. When you actually took those decks apart, however, they were all either Raffinity or a Red- or Green-based artifact-hate deck.

A Legacy metagame in which only discard, counterspells, and combo are viable is intrinsically unhealthy, even if combo is the weakest performing of those three. Tendrils combo alone can apply the pressure that keeps other decks from being viable while still being a worse choice than a Force-based deck.

That's not to say that we're not necessarily at that point. But people need to keep their finger on this. Casually assuming that Tendrils combo is fair and healthy for the format because it's not the top deck is foolish, and misses the point entirely.

Not to sound like a jerk, but I think people are missing the point because there isn't much of a point here. You say:


A Legacy metagame in which only discard, counterspells, and combo are viable is intrinsically unhealthy...

and immediately follow it with:


That's not to say that we're not necessarily at that point.

So if we're not at that point, what's the problem? We need to watch out? Is that it? Don't we already know that? Isn't that what all these discussions are about, watching out?

I get what you're saying about hate vs. top 8s, but the same could be said of Dredge. So many people pack grave hate in their sideboard for (not only, but largely) Dredge, even though Dredge doesn't top 8 often at all. So, does that make Dredge unfair and we need to watch it? Legacy is a format packed with brokenness and that's why it's so good. Eternal formats are supposed to be broken because the decks are stuffed with the best cards and/or the most synergistic decks from Magic's entire catalog. Storm-based combo decks, Belcher, and blue-based Force of Will supported combo decks all have their advantages and all have their own form of brokenness.

I think we can turn the tables on your last sentence and say that it's a little naive to think that because you need to protect yourself against some tier 1 strategies, like Storm, that the format is somehow warped or unfair. It's crazy to compare Legacy to Raffinity Standard since those Standard decks packed 4-8 artifact hate slots mainboard. If we were to say Storm is equivalent and just hated out of top 8s, we should see lots of maindeck Mindbreak Traps or some other form of Storm hate, but we don't.

Now, I'm ready for the list of fallacies I made and links to their respective wiki pages. :wink:

[menace13]

IBA has a valid point in that combo has the potential to be the most broken of any archetype. This has shown over and again, anytime spells can be chained to win the turn they are played is going to be more powerful than turning a 4/5 sideways.


Also, off topic- not so sure WGDragon, were it to have been unbanned, wouldn't have been better than animator(with M.Tutor legal) since it can play Pact of Negation in additon to discard/countersuite/Stifle and its shell only needs 4 creatures.

[MMogg]

IBA has a valid point in that combo has the potential to be the most broken of any archetype. This has shown over and again, anytime spells can be chained to win the turn they are played is going to be more powerful than turning a 4/5 sideways.

But the article was about the current state of Legacy, not about the potential for brokenness from combo decks.

Even still, can you think of a format with a broader range of viable decks? I can't. Potential be damned, the beauty of Legacy, as I said, is that there is so much brokenness, from broken counter magic (Force of Will) to broken creature removal (Swords to Plowshares) to broken aggro (Tarmogoyf) to broken combo (Storm). It's all broken, all the time. That's the nature of Eternal. When one starts saying things like "the deck isn't making top 8s, but it's still format warping" you get into dangerous territory of Ari Lax style blanket bannings in order to keep brokenness in check. As it is now, I think it's pretty much perfect and balanced with no outstanding 1 superior deck. Even before the Mystical ban, there seemed to be a kind of building consensus that Reanimator was the best deck, but even still, it didn't manage to dominate the format. Post-banning that's gone and what's left is a bunch of deck archetypes vying for supremacy.

If anything, it isn't an archetype, rather, the ludicrous fatties like Progenitus, Iona and Emrakul (and maybe we can also classify Jace, the Skullf**ker in this category despite not being a creature) that are breaking the format more than Tendrils. Maindecks have to be able to deal with crazy fatties or die.

Bottom line for me: proactivity is good in many aspects of life, but Magic bannings is not one of them, so talking about potential brokenness is wholly academic.

[ktkenshinx]

I think you're missing the point. As Gleicher notes, based on the top 8's, the Raffinity environment wasn't broken; there was an acceptable diversity in archetypes by a historic standard. When you actually took those decks apart, however, they were all either Raffinity or a Red- or Green-based artifact-hate deck.

A Legacy metagame in which only discard, counterspells, and combo are viable is intrinsically unhealthy, even if combo is the weakest performing of those three. Tendrils combo alone can apply the pressure that keeps other decks from being viable while still being a worse choice than a Force-based deck.
I believe that you are an experienced player who either played in the Affinity days of old, or at least followed the tournament scene back then. MMogg's assessment is an accurate one; the analog to modern day Legacy would be a format in which explicitly storm-hating cards are packed into maindecks, just like Oxidize and Molder Slug saw heavy maindeck play at the time (the former as an almost auto-4-of in every deck that wasn't Affinity; and some decks that were).

Comparing Force of Will and Duress to the proverbial Mindbreak Trap/Ethersworn Canonist is silly. It is especially silly because the only deck that heavily used discard had only 1 showing in the top 8. Every other deck was a blue deck using FoW, and you know why? Because FoW is just plain good. Not just good at stopping combo, but good in general. It happens to stop combo and slow storm-based decks pretty neatly, but that is not why it sees play. DrJones on another thread can explain at length his own interpretation of that top 8, and even if you disagree with his overall point, some of his individual statements are undoubtedly spot on regarding FoW's singular power.


That's not to say that we're not necessarily at that point. But people need to keep their finger on this. Casually assuming that Tendrils combo is fair and healthy for the format because it's not the top deck is foolish, and misses the point entirely.
The assumption in any format should be "watch out", especially in a healthy one where complacency is possible. This thread, and the people posting in it against Tendrils and Storm, are saying a little bit more than just "watch out". They are saying "watch out right now, because we think that something is unusual". And truly, what is so unusual about the present format? Can people really suggest that a deck with lower top 8 performance and appearances is really a threat due to intangible and abstruse factors like bad players, irrational aversion to playing it, and maindecked cards that accidentally counter the deck? That's a really bad argument on a lot of levels.

MT was not a bad ban because it slowed down storm just enough to keep it a contender, not a dominator. That's how it is now, and that's how it is going to be for a while.

-ktkenshinx-

[ktkenshinx]

I believe that you are an experienced player who either played in the Affinity days of old, or at least followed the tournament scene back then. MMogg's assessment is an accurate one; the analog to modern day Legacy would be a format in which explicitly storm-hating cards are packed into maindecks, just like Oxidize and Molder Slug saw heavy maindeck play at the time (the former as an almost auto-4-of in every deck that wasn't Affinity; and some decks that were).

Comparing Force of Will and Duress to the proverbial Mindbreak Trap/Ethersworn Canonist is silly. It is especially silly because the only deck that heavily used discard had only 1 showing in the top 8. Every other deck was a blue deck using FoW, and you know why? Because FoW is just plain good. Not just good at stopping combo, but good in general. It happens to stop combo and slow storm-based decks pretty neatly, but that is not why it sees play. DrJones on another thread can explain at length his own interpretation of that top 8, and even if you disagree with his overall point, some of his individual statements are undoubtedly spot on regarding FoW's singular power.


The assumption in any format should be "watch out", especially in a healthy one where complacency is possible. This thread, and the people posting in it against Tendrils and Storm, are saying a little bit more than just "watch out". They are saying "watch out right now, because we think that something is unusual". And truly, what is so unusual about the present format? Can people really suggest that a deck with lower top 8 performance and appearances is really a threat due to intangible and abstruse factors like bad players, irrational aversion to playing it, and maindecked cards that accidentally counter the deck? That's a really bad argument on a lot of levels.

MT was not a bad ban because it slowed down storm just enough to keep it a contender, not a dominator. That's how it is now, and that's how it is going to be for a while.

-ktkenshinx-

PS:

Potential be damned, the beauty of Legacy, as I said, is that there is so much brokenness, from broken counter magic (Force of Will) to broken creature removal (Swords to Plowshares) to broken aggro (Tarmogoyf) to broken combo (Storm). It's all broken, all the time. That's the nature of Eternal.
This is a true statement. I suggest that players understand that there is broken (the cards listed) and there is Broken (Yawgmoth's Will).

[kinda]

I think you're missing the point. As Gleicher notes, based on the top 8's, the Raffinity environment wasn't broken; there was an acceptable diversity in archetypes by a historic standard. When you actually took those decks apart, however, they were all either Raffinity or a Red- or Green-based artifact-hate deck.

A Legacy metagame in which only discard, counterspells, and combo are viable is intrinsically unhealthy, even if combo is the weakest performing of those three. Tendrils combo alone can apply the pressure that keeps other decks from being viable while still being a worse choice than a Force-based deck.

That's not to say that we're not necessarily at that point. But people need to keep their finger on this. Casually assuming that Tendrils combo is fair and healthy for the format because it's not the top deck is foolish, and misses the point entirely.

I don't think a tendrils ban would drop the protection numbers in the format significantly...legacy's card pool allows enough broken plays that protection heavy decks are here to stay.

The thing about the gp top 8 is that there are 3 pillars of legacy...but NONE of the deck in the t8 played by these rules.
1) Protection Spell Decks
2) Decks that prey on the inherent card disadvantage of protection spell decks
3) Non interactive combo decks that consistently win before the #2 decks

Every deck in that top 8 combined two of those pillars...

The show and tell decks and TES were combo decks with 8+ md protection spells.
The protection spell decks all had a raw card advantage engine (jace, confidant, standstill/silvergill)

In summary every deck in the top 8 ran protection spells and some way to compensate for this...either by a combo win or a card advantage engine. This translates to the decks in the top 8 not having any awful matchups unlike decks that don't combine pillars do. As far as the health of legacy is concerned...protection spells are here to stay until decks without them can consistently race combo or beat the decks that are running protection spells despite their card advantage engines.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

It's misleading to talk about combo. Most Combo, whether it was Aluren or Dragon or Emrakul or even Hulk-Flash, has some permanent element that makes it vulnerable to removal spells of some type in other colors.

The distinction with Tendrils combo is that it only really uses the stack. Which means that only counters and to a much lesser extent discard stop it. White has Chant/Abeyance effects, but those are hard to maindeck outside of Tendrils itself.

The point isn't that you just watch out for broken. The point is that at some point Tendrils combo will again push the format to the point where something needs to be banned to weaken it, and this will be a common recurrence until Tendrils itself or most of the fast mana that enables it is banned. And at that point it may not actually be the most powerful deck. But if top 8's consistently look like Columbus: if the metagame boils down to Thoughtseize decks, FoW decks, and Tendrils decks, then that will be a sign that the format is utterly fucked. And you don't understand how metagames work if you don't think the Tendrils boogeyman is a huge part of what is strengthening discard and counter strategies.

[kinda]

I don't think a thoutseize/force (counting tendrils is redundant as TES runs thoughtseize) dominated format is such a bad thing. The card pool is so vast that not running blanket protection spells will open you up to problems and tech you might not be able to deal with via more specified hate cards.

I'm aware tendrils is the face of combo but banning tendrils would have a similar effect to the dissolving of the soviet union. At least people know how to play against tendrils and that counterbalance is very good in that matchup...without tendrils blanket protection spells like thoughtseize/force are going to be needed even more to deal with the magnitude of different combo decks until a new face of combo arises. Also, force/seize are not what is keeping tendrils in check...Saito in his gp report said that despite running 15 md protection spells he knew he was a dog to ANT.

I don't know much about dragon and haven't been impressed with aluren...but I have to disagree that tendrils avoiding permanets makes it clearly the best combo deck (vs. emrakul). I would agree that it is if counterbalance wasn't such a commonly played card. Counterbalance.deck was the second most commonly played archetype (If I remember correctly) on day two of the GP. The thing about counterbalance is that while being very good vs. tendrils its also very good against much of the format...unlike emrakul hate. I've tested alot of different emrakul decks and can safely say that countering show and tell or doomsday or natural order (or seizing them) is a much better solution then trying to pack emrakul hate into your deck (especialy if the deck is running progenitus or form too...but I'll ignore that). Most of the emrakul hate cards can be wiped away, griped, or easily countered if the deck is not running black or blue. The two cards that can pose a problem are karakas and jace...and jace is blue and doesn't work if it's hasted...and karakas is a very awkward card for most decks and is usually a legendary non-basic plains.

[Gandalf_The_White]

It's misleading to talk about combo. Most Combo, whether it was Aluren or Dragon or Emrakul or even Hulk-Flash, has some permanent element that makes it vulnerable to removal spells of some type in other colors.

The distinction with Tendrils combo is that it only really uses the stack. Which means that only counters and to a much lesser extent discard stop it. White has Chant/Abeyance effects, but those are hard to maindeck outside of Tendrils itself.

Not true. Cards like Trinisphere, Chalice of the Void, Thorn of Amethest, and Sphere of Resistance are extremely effective at disrupting Storm combo.



People might want to chill the fuck out about talking about how fair storm combo is. The fact that it doesn't use permanents makes the deck sort of fundamentally unfair compared to most traditional combo. More cards will eventually have to be banned to keep it in check unless they finally nuke the main culprit of Tendrils.


The point is that at some point Tendrils combo will again push the format to the point where something needs to be banned to weaken it, and this will be a common recurrence until Tendrils itself or most of the fast mana that enables it is banned.

Could you explain why you believe this to be the case?

[ummon]

Not true. Cards like Trinisphere, Chalice of the Void, Thorn of Amethest, and Sphere of Resistance are extremely effective at disrupting Storm combo.



Could you explain why you believe this to be the case?

LED has to be banned, as it allows you to do crazy stuff way too early in the game. As long as you have a few other mana sources to get started, you can sidestep the land drop based tempo system and effectively get a Black Lotus. That is too overpowered. While banning Ad Nauseum would work, I'd rather see LED banned, as it is the card that is fundamentally broken, not Ad Nauseum, which without crazy mana producers would be weak.

[ktkenshinx]

LED has to be banned, as it allows you to do crazy stuff way too early in the game. As long as you have a few other mana sources to get started, you can sidestep the land drop based tempo system and effectively get a Black Lotus. That is too overpowered. While banning Ad Nauseum would work, I'd rather see LED banned, as it is the card that is fundamentally broken, not Ad Nauseum, which without crazy mana producers would be weak.
This is a really opinion and hyperbole heavy argument. Where on earth are these storm and combo opponents getting their information and evidence? The way that some people here are talking, it sounds like Legacy is in a neverending struggle against Storm combo, and that all instances of storm combo are inherently unhealthy for the format. Given that all good combo decks these days are storm, are we to just believe that combo is a doomed archetype? That combo just fucks up a format no matter what? Certainly most of the egregious offenders of Magic card-balance have been combo based, but these are not cards that lie dormant for years only to suddenly be squashed. With the sole exception of Mystical Tutor, combo decks and their constituent parts make a big impact and then get a big response. The evidence in that regard is clear, looking at past bannings and events. Modern Legacy does not mirror that at all.

In fact, modern Legacy looks quite healthy. There was only 1 Tendrils of Agony played in a maindeck in the entire T8, and that was in Cook's TES list. It turns out that LED only made one appearance in the T8, and that was also in TES. As to the Day 2 Metagame Breakdown...

Zoo 20
Bant* 16
CounterTop 12
Merfolk 10
Goblins 10
Aluren 7
Land 6
Belcher 6
ANT 5
Landstill 4

Those were the heavy hitters, and that looks remarkably similar to every event that has happened this year except with even LESS showing from storm-based combo. Of those ANT decks, only one of them made finals (Cook, although his deck is not ANT despite what Wizards claims). Belcher? None. Aluren? Are you kidding. The raw facts do not lie; combo did not show up in any alarming quantity.

There are lots of storm alarmists in this format. Similarly, there are lots of combo alarmists in Magic. Some people have backed up their arguments with evidence and well-reasoned fact piecing together. But for the most part, the Tendrils/Storm/LED/Combo scare is as much a part of Magic as fears of terrorism are a part of American politics. Mystical Tutor's banning was the equivalent of attacking Taliban training camps. Anything more and we get into Wizards own version of Afghanistan and Iraq.

Combo is fine. When evidence (not theoretical musing about play errors/deck preferences/metagame trend tracking/etc) says otherwise, then that is a time to talk and act.

-ktkenshinx-

[Gandalf_The_White]

LED has to be banned, as it allows you to do crazy stuff way too early in the game. As long as you have a few other mana sources to get started, you can sidestep the land drop based tempo system and effectively get a Black Lotus. That is too overpowered.
This seems like a weak argument to me. Allow me to demonstrate by using the same structure to argue for the banning of different cards:

"[Goblin Lackey] has to be banned, as it allows you to do crazy stuff way too early in the game. As long as you have a [Goblin in hand], you can sidestep the the land drop based tempo system and effectively get a [free, resuable, one-sided Show and Tell]. That is too overpowered."

"[Survival of the Fittest] has to be banned, as it allows you to do crazy stuff way too early in the game. As long as you have a [creature and a] few other mana sources to get started, you can sidestep the [draw step based card advantage system] and effectively get a[n acestral recall+demonic tutor]. That is too overpowered."

"[Counterbalance] has to be banned, as it allows you to do crazy stuff way too early in the game. As long as you have a [Sensei's Divining Top and a] few other mana sources to get started, you can sidestep the [card advantage and tempo system] and effectively get [reusable counterspells to lock your opponent out of the game]. That is too overpowered."

The whole point of the article under discussion, by the way, is that empircal evidence about how decks perform is the best way to determine whether or not cards should be banned, not arguments in the form of "card X does Y which is IMBA therefore ban."

Also, you forgot to mention that LED requires other business spells and something to actually do with the mana while your hand is empty (not just, "a few other mana sources").

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

I'm aware tendrils is the face of combo but banning tendrils would have a similar effect to the dissolving of the soviet union. At least people know how to play against tendrils and that counterbalance is very good in that matchup...without tendrils blanket protection spells like thoughtseize/force are going to be needed even more to deal with the magnitude of different combo decks until a new face of combo arises.

Not really. In old 1.5 we had MUD, Dragon, Enchantress, and Trix, but people still played straight-aggro all over the place. The thing is that these decks were all hit by counters and discard + something else. Whether people are maindecking Diabolic Edict or Qasali Pridemage, there are other ways to deal with other forms of combo that aren't Storm.


Also, force/seize are not what is keeping tendrils in check...Saito in his gp report said that despite running 15 md protection spells he knew he was a dog to ANT.

Saito's analysis is not the standard one. If you think Merfolk doesn't have a good ANT matchup I'd like to know what you think does.


I don't know much about dragon and haven't been impressed with aluren...but I have to disagree that tendrils avoiding permanets makes it clearly the best combo deck (vs. emrakul).

No, that's not what I'm saying. Fast mana and Tendrils of Agony itself make it the best combo deck. The fact that it doesn't use permanents is what makes it death stomp almost everything without black or blue in it.


I would agree that it is if counterbalance wasn't such a commonly played card. Counterbalance.deck was the second most commonly played archetype (If I remember correctly) on day two of the GP. The thing about counterbalance is that while being very good vs. tendrils its also very good against much of the format...unlike emrakul hate. I've tested alot of different emrakul decks and can safely say that countering show and tell or doomsday or natural order (or seizing them) is a much better solution then trying to pack emrakul hate into your deck (especialy if the deck is running progenitus or form too...but I'll ignore that). Most of the emrakul hate cards can be wiped away, griped, or easily countered if the deck is not running black or blue. The two cards that can pose a problem are karakas and jace...and jace is blue and doesn't work if it's hasted...and karakas is a very awkward card for most decks and is usually a legendary non-basic plains.

The, "I'll just counter/discard their hate spells" has been part of the argument for more than a decade, so I'm going to spend very little time debunking this. If a deck can routinely fight through maindeck hate without difficulty, like Hulk-Flash did for instance, then something needs to be banned. But this is discussing the strengths and weaknesses of conventional combo, not Tendrils combo where it's not really relevant since the only decks running relevant maindeck hate that isn't blue or black are bad Stax variants.


Not true. Cards like Trinisphere, Chalice of the Void, Thorn of Amethest, and Sphere of Resistance are extremely effective at disrupting Storm combo.

None of which can be maindecked outside of Stax lists which tend to be clanky and bad.


Could you explain why you believe this to be the case?

Because Tendrils of Agony has been a perennial headache since it was printed, sidestepping most hate and fighting even counters/discard fairly well. As time goes on and new ways to abuse it are developed it only becomes more potently obnoxious.


This is a really opinion and hyperbole heavy argument. Where on earth are these storm and combo opponents getting their information and evidence? The way that some people here are talking, it sounds like Legacy is in a neverending struggle against Storm combo, and that all instances of storm combo are inherently unhealthy for the format. Given that all good combo decks these days are storm, are we to just believe that combo is a doomed archetype? That combo just fucks up a format no matter what? Certainly most of the egregious offenders of Magic card-balance have been combo based, but these are not cards that lie dormant for years only to suddenly be squashed. With the sole exception of Mystical Tutor, combo decks and their constituent parts make a big impact and then get a big response. The evidence in that regard is clear, looking at past bannings and events. Modern Legacy does not mirror that at all.

Illusion of Grandeur, Hermit Druid, Dragon, Aluren, Survival, Flash, Ichorid... you're about as wrong in this regard as it is at all possible to be.


In fact, modern Legacy looks quite healthy. There was only 1 Tendrils of Agony played in a maindeck in the entire T8, and that was in Cook's TES list. It turns out that LED only made one appearance in the T8, and that was also in TES. As to the Day 2 Metagame Breakdown...

Zoo 20
Bant* 16
CounterTop 12
Merfolk 10
Goblins 10
Aluren 7
Land 6
Belcher 6
ANT 5
Landstill 4

1) Again, a deck doesn't have to be the best deck in a metagame to break a metagame. If Hulk-Flash had actually lost consistently to Fish or Gro lists, it would still have been busted as long as it continued smashing the rest of the field while having marginally unfavorable matchups. The format would've been Hulk-Flash, Fish, and bad decks that beat Fish, and it still would've been stupid and required bannings.

2) Legacy isn't there yet (for the fourth or fifth time). The point is just that Tendrils is a ticking and unhealthy time bomb. The top 8 at GP Columbus was not a desirable one, and if future top 8s continue to look like that it's a serious problem.


Those were the heavy hitters, and that looks remarkably similar to every event that has happened this year except with even LESS showing from storm-based combo. Of those ANT decks, only one of them made finals (Cook, although his deck is not ANT despite what Wizards claims). Belcher? None. Aluren? Are you kidding. The raw facts do not lie; combo did not show up in any alarming quantity.

Again you're kind of missing the actual topic of discussion.


There are lots of storm alarmists in this format. Similarly, there are lots of combo alarmists in Magic. Some people have backed up their arguments with evidence and well-reasoned fact piecing together. But for the most part, the Tendrils/Storm/LED/Combo scare is as much a part of Magic as fears of terrorism are a part of American politics. Mystical Tutor's banning was the equivalent of attacking Taliban training camps. Anything more and we get into Wizards own version of Afghanistan and Iraq.

This is the worst metaphor anyone has ever used on this forum.


Combo is fine. When evidence (not theoretical musing about play errors/deck preferences/metagame trend tracking/etc) says otherwise, then that is a time to talk and act.

And when will it say otherwise?

[dontbiteitholmes]

Damnit IBA, you might be able to fool the newcomers, but some of us have been around since 1.5. People played "straight aggo" in the old 1.5, sure why not, but how many people with a playset of Workshops, Bazaars, or Drains played aggro? Not that it even matters really, but lets not act like Workshop, Drain, and Bazaar weren't basically the format 7ish years ago (or has it been even longer PS I'm old).

Also I think everyone figuring out Firespout was really good had more to do with a lack of aggro in the top 8 than any kind of combo.

[ktkenshinx]

2) Legacy isn't there yet (for the fourth or fifth time). The point is just that Tendrils is a ticking and unhealthy time bomb. The top 8 at GP Columbus was not a desirable one, and if future top 8s continue to look like that it's a serious problem.
...
And when will it say otherwise?
These are the only things I am going to respond to, as they are the quotes that actually bear on this discussion. Without citing a huge body of Legacy T8 evidence that I do not want to outline now, but will outline if necessary, this T8 at Columbus is not representative of an unhealthy metagame. There have been past examples of unhealthy metagames across all Magic formats, and they really do not look like this one. The closest analogs are formats where one deck is dominant and other decks must adapt to counter that deck, or they will lose. Goblins (Legacy), Affinity (Standard/Extended), Jund (Standard), and Faeries (Standard), are all examples of this. You will remember that only one of those decks (Affinity) led to any serious round of bannings. And these were all formats with major defining decks, and while those decks did not have the raw power of Tendrils, did not use stack-based win conditions like Tendrils, and took less skill to play than Storm combo, they were still dominant, format-defining decks. Their Top 8s were unhealthy, and if you remember reading those tournament reports like I do, ESPECIALLY in the Affinity days, you will remember how ugly those were. Columbus '10 looks nothing like that. A shade of it? Maybe. But nothing like it.

If the argument here is "watch out", that's fine. But if the argument here is "do something preemptive", that's a lot less fine. There is nothing to do now that is not speculative and opion-based. When will the evidence say otherwise? When you have Top 8s looking like they did back when Disciple and Ravager ran amok, or every creature in a top 8 was a Faerie, then that's an unhealthy format. Even then, however, that does not absolutely necessitate bannings. We are just not there yet, and this thread inherently suggests that we are a lot closer to that point than we actually are.

-ktkenshinx-

[Amon Amarth]

Also I think everyone figuring out Firespout was really good had more to do with a lack of aggro in the top 8 than any kind of combo.

I think it also has to do with how good Show and Tell is, which is kind of a combo that most people weren't prepared for since Emrakul and the neutered Tinker that put him in play require different answers than most kinds of combo decks.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

Damnit IBA, you might be able to fool the newcomers, but some of us have been around since 1.5. People played "straight aggo" in the old 1.5, sure why not, but how many people with a playset of Workshops, Bazaars, or Drains played aggro? Not that it even matters really, but lets not act like Workshop, Drain, and Bazaar weren't basically the format 7ish years ago (or has it been even longer PS I'm old).

Also I think everyone figuring out Firespout was really good had more to do with a lack of aggro in the top 8 than any kind of combo.

Um, bullshit. White Weenie and ZillaStompy were actual honest to God decks that did damned well in a format full of decks 10x as expensive. Wayfarer White Weenie legitimately raped the top combo decks of the format, MUD and Dragon.


These are the only things I am going to respond to, as they are the quotes that actually bear on this discussion. Without citing a huge body of Legacy T8 evidence that I do not want to outline now, but will outline if necessary, this T8 at Columbus is not representative of an unhealthy metagame. There have been past examples of unhealthy metagames across all Magic formats, and they really do not look like this one.

Grand Prix Flash had 5 Force-based decks, including 3 of the titular combo, 2 Hymn-based decks and 1 Tribal Aggro.

Grand Prix Columbus 2.0 had 1 Storm deck, 1 Hymn-based deck, and 6 Force-based decks. In terms of archetype representation it was far lower than what was one of the most metagamese in Magic history. You really want to be making the case here that Columbus' results were unusual and unrepresentative of the broader metagame.

Granted that I don't think people were gunning for Tendrils with the same ferocity that they went after Flash, but it remains a black hole in the format. It doesn't put up extraordinary results, but the number of decks it keeps from being viable is pretty impressive.


The closest analogs are formats where one deck is dominant and other decks must adapt to counter that deck, or they will lose. Goblins (Legacy), Affinity (Standard/Extended), Jund (Standard), and Faeries (Standard), are all examples of this. You will remember that only one of those decks (Affinity) led to any serious round of bannings. And these were all formats with major defining decks, and while those decks did not have the raw power of Tendrils, did not use stack-based win conditions like Tendrils, and took less skill to play than Storm combo, they were still dominant, format-defining decks. Their Top 8s were unhealthy, and if you remember reading those tournament reports like I do, ESPECIALLY in the Affinity days, you will remember how ugly those were. Columbus '10 looks nothing like that. A shade of it? Maybe. But nothing like it.

The problem here is that adaption doesn't play out equally. Every deck and color archetype had ways to deal with Goblins or Jund (at least post-Worldwake). Tendrils is most like Raffinity in Standard; only 40% of the color pie actually has the ability to deal with it. It's really more like 30%, even, as black just isn't anywhere as effective against Tendrils as blue is.


If the argument here is "watch out", that's fine. But if the argument here is "do something preemptive", that's a lot less fine. There is nothing to do now that is not speculative and opion-based. When will the evidence say otherwise? When you have Top 8s looking like they did back when Disciple and Ravager ran amok, or every creature in a top 8 was a Faerie, then that's an unhealthy format. Even then, however, that does not absolutely necessitate bannings. We are just not there yet, and this thread inherently suggests that we are a lot closer to that point than we actually are.

-ktkenshinx-

The argument is that while the format is still enjoyable, it would be better off without Tendrils. It's a malignant growth that's almost certainly going to have to be dealt with sooner or later. The damage would be less to deal with it now, and little of value to anyone except Bryant Cook would be lost.

[Rune]

I don't really see the problem..

Storm combo is hard to play, especially now that MT is gone and Spell Pierce is in the 75 of every blue deck. There should be some kind of reward when you dedicate a lot of time and energy into becoming better at playing difficult decks. Zoo and Merfolk are some of the most powerful decks and if you are already a decent Magic player, then it will take literally 30 minutes to become good at playing these decks. The same can't exactly be said about TES and Doomsday.

Except for David Ochoa, there were basically no pros picking up Tendrils decks for GP Colombus. David Ochoa is a very good eternal player and he chose to play Doomsday, a card he was familiar with from Vintage. He dropped from the tournament after 3 straight losses due to his own misplays. If Tendrils decks were so broken, then why didn't the pros play those decks instead of those blue control builds?

Storm combo's worst matchup is also one of the most played (if not most played) archetype in Legacy: Counterbalance. Doomsday Tendrils has a even/good matchup against CB, but compared to TES it also has some other matchups that are weaker.

If you want to dumb down the format for no reason, then go ahead and ban Tendrils.

[Gheizen64]

I, on the other hand, see the problem exactly like IBA. Storm is a stupid mechanic that is basically impossible to hate outside of blue and black. Artifact that hose the combo are, honestly, unplayable except in prison, that, again, it's unplayable. But it's not a problem of storm per se. It's more a problem of tendrils. A storm deck that revolved around Warrens for example, would be perfectly fine for me since you can maindeck answers to that are perfectly decent card in any deck (spout, ee, powder keg, etc...). As long as tendrils deck are good, they make the top decks in any tournament for the major part blue and or black, since non blue, non black decks are pretty much guaranteed to lose a game as soon as they see this kind of deck. Tendril is the major reason the format has been basically filled by counter-top and blue-green variants since his inception.
If the main combo deck were Hermit (that's banned and a bad card imho), every color would have answer to it and would fear not to give a bye to such decks having to encounter it sooner or later in a tournament. Earthcraft is another combo card that would be hateable by every color, except red that would have to splash.
With tendril gone, the storm would have to revolve against brainfreeze, dragonstorm, empty the warrens or grapeshot. Grapeshot is hated A LOT by simple lifegain and honestly it's too bad in general. Brainfreeze need 14-15 storm and it's hated by a single gaea's blessing in your deck, hardly a big design costraint on your deck. Dragonstorm is similar to tendril in the sense you win as soon as you cast it but it's MUCH slower and unusable with Ad Nauseam. Also, Dragonstorm usually can do 20 or 25, not more, so, again, it would be hateable by some lifegain.

Imho, on the banned list there are many much better (read, manageable) combo than tendril. Tendril is stupid and you might hate it out as much as you want by banning single piece of the combo, but as long as he's faster than any aggro deck, he'll still be a force that push out any non-blue non-black deck out of the format. I honestly don't want to see 30+ force of wills every top8.

[Piceli89]

Imho, on the banned list there are many much better (read, manageable) combo than tendril. Tendril is stupid and you might hate it out as much as you want by banning single piece of the combo, but as long as he's faster than any aggro deck, he'll still be a force that push out any non-blue non-black deck out of the format. I honestly don't want to see 30+ force of wills every top8.

*Facepalm*
Because it's Tendrils that forces the presence of FoW decks. Also, combo is prefectly legitimate to exist in Legacy as it is an eternal format with the most powerul sorceries and instants. Do you want to play with the most performing undercosted creatures if Legacy, paired with burn spells or mana disruption and a super-fast clock? You will successfully trump the majority of slower, non controllish decks, that the canonic pieces of disruption (Fow above all) against you might not be that great, but deal with the fact you are giving little or no form of trouble to the Storm mechanic that ignores permanents only designed to bash face (half your deck) but which usually folds against most of the decks you're strong against. A bonus in exchange of a weakness, that how it works.
Also, how many combo decks do you meet in the swiss now? It's not the Ad Nauseam ubiquity time anymore. Now you're playing against slower or more inconsistent (or more difficult to play builds). I don't really think Wizards needs to ban another piece of storm combo because now it shows up in less numbers, only piloted by skilled players. The GP Columbus top8 we continue to take as a referement is not a microcosm of the real situation, it has 3 combo decks of which 2 are pretty gross and does not regard Storm mechanic, the other one was piloted by a quite good person. I'd rather worry more about the very low skill requirements that it takes to cast a Show and Tell/Natural Order for Emrakul/Progenitus and let those King-Kongs autowin for you games otherwise lost, than piloting a very difficult deck like Fetchland Tendrils.

The fact, in general, is that you can't expect anymore to be successful in Legacy with a deck that does not interfere, or disrupt, the opponent more or less heavily. You say blue and discard, but I could also Bolts, Teegs, Qasalis, Jitte, Vindicates, and so on; these have to be considered piece of disruption, even if they can be played around somehow. Often I'm in some trouble playing against Zoo with Doomsday if they land a Qasali because I can't go for double LED or use SDT properly w/DD. It happens a lot. That's legit.
I know some people would like to win tournaments with Manaramp+Fatties dec or with turboElves, but their failure should not be related to the existance of Storm Combo, but to their excessively linear gameplan (creature, creature, creature) which makes it very easy to stop them. It's not a case that they also lose to way more played cards like EE or Firespout, which are in a lot of blue decks as of now. Merfolk is the perect example on demostrating how a generic Elves deck could top8 if it packed proactive disruption and strong draw engines.

I can't also see how aggro pilots can mourn about Storm Combo, in the last 3 years Wizards has gifted then with bomb after bomb (Nacatl, Lynx, Knight, Pridemage, Goyf, Path to Exile, Instigator, Weirding, all the new Elves and Gobs and lords, the entire Merfolk deck) while we only have received Ad Nauseam and Ponder. But we don't get to play with Ad Nauseam in solid shells (i.e., not TES) because, well, they banned Mystical Tutor.
However, until Wizards bans Dark Ritual-which won't happen-, feel free to dedicate 10 slots between Canonists and Traps and Spheres and Glowriders, for a matchup that you'll meet about once in 8 rounds of swiss if you're lucky.

[Mantis]

The continuing trend I see in these threads, is that people complain about Tendrills combo decks and then the combo players step up and tell these people that they have to stop complaining, their deck is completely fair. The combo players are just talking in their own interest, they don't want to lose their edge against the field and come up with arguments that the deck is fair because it's skill intensive. They think they are doing well because they are such skillful players, but their judgement is clouded, the deck is just unbeatable for every non FoW deck if the combo player doesn't screw up terribly. Goblins and Zoo are skill intensive as well, but the best player in the world would lose with Zoo against combo, if that pilot is semi decent. Now how does this make the argument that the most skillful player should win the game true?

For a big tournament such as a GP where you are almost guaranteed to face a storm deck sooner or later the choice for a player wanting to make T8 is limited to 3 options; pray to god you won't face a Storm deck, play a FoW/CB deck or play Storm yourself and lose to every FoW deck. Option 1 is terrible so the choice is down to these 2 options, how is this a healthy format?

And please don't bring up the fact that I like to play Goblins and just want to have Storm gone from the format so I have a better chance. I would never complain about Zoo for example, I accept bad matchups but I just hate sitting there and hope my opponent screws bad, at some point.

EDIT: I do have to concede the point that banning Mystical Tutor was a step in the right directions and my arguments ring less true then before, but even so, the problem is Tendrills for reasons IBA discussed in length.

[Gheizen64]

*Facepalm*
Because it's Tendrils that forces the presence of FoW decks.

Yes, it's tendril. Because, face it, you're playing a card that is really good only against combo matchup. I wouldn't be against combo if combo could be hated out by color that are not black or blue, but that's the state of combo since the printing of the storm mechanic.



However, until Wizards bans Dark Ritual-which won't happen-, feel free to dedicate 10 slots between Canonists and Traps and Spheres and Glowriders, for a matchup that you'll meet about once in 8 rounds of swiss if you're lucky.

I don't care about ritual, i care just about tendril. All the cards you listed suck, and exactly because they suck you won't use them and you'll lose that time you face tendril, whereas, for example, Aluren is hated by a lot of other splash hate cards that you can run in any color. Until tendril is banned, and unless wizards print some really, REALLY strong hate in non-blue colors, every T8 of every tournament will have shitload of FoWs. You could argue that since it's a paper-rock-scissor meta, it should be healty, but when it become tendril/blue/anti-blue for me it isn't healty anymore, sorry.

Your sarcastic remarks about *decks* that i'd like to play are just uncommentable.

[swoop]

People play FoW not because of Tendrils (facepalm) but because Force of Will is plain good against MOST of the matchups.
The card is good because its GOOD. And its a two-card-zero-mana solution to almost everything.

Tendrils/blue/anti-blue? what the hell dude? What metagame have you been playing?

There are gazilion decks that use gazilion cards, and some of them use same colours, some of them same cards, or mana base.
Does it mean all are blue/anti-blue/tendrils? Jesus christ man, you're strange.

the meta isnt ROCK PAPER SCISSORS. its like this:
http://www.jeffisageek.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/rpssl.gif

And since when is FoW great against Tendrills? I thougt mindbreak trap was better.

[Gheizen64]

People play FoW not because of Tendrils (facepalm) but because Force of Will is plain good against MOST of the matchups.
The card is good because its GOOD. And its a two-card-zero-mana solution to almost everything.

Tendrils/blue/anti-blue? what the hell dude? What metagame have you been playing?

There are gazilion decks that use gazilion cards, and some of them use same colours, some of them same cards, or mana base.
Does it mean all are blue/anti-blue/tendrils? Jesus christ man, you're strange.

the meta isnt ROCK PAPER SCISSORS. its like this:
http://www.jeffisageek.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/rpssl.gif

And since when is FoW great against Tendrills? I thougt mindbreak trap was better.

You're missing the point or just sidetracking volountarily. FoW isn't good against tendril per se, please be reasonable. FoW it's good because it's a free counter against decks that use only stack to win on turn 2-3. Not to say the resources FoW uses are mostly irrilevant against such kind of decks, while against aggressive decks they are most relevant (card advantage, life).

You're saying you see gazillion decks that uses gazillion cards. Lately i checked some tournaments results and it wasn't that kind of meta. Columbus top 8 had 7 decks with blue of which one was a storm deck and a BGW deck with 10 maindecked discard cards (plus 3 extirpate and 3 more duresses in the side) . The deck that won all was an anti-blue deck. Ironically, that was also blue.
I'm not saying we're already at *that* point, but if more and more tourney ends up like this, i feel something should be done. We doesn't care about the Gazillion of decks, we care about the decks that win consistently.

You could also refrain from personal comment when i'm talkin about a pov that's not only mine.

EDIT: ironically, at least in Madrid the anti-blue deck was Zoo (3 Zoo, 2 AnT, 1 Reanimator, 2 countertops). But it look like Zoo can't compete with counterbalance + firespout decks as well as merfolk do. Or maybe the latest trends in going bombs in zoo (elspeth and the like) made the deck not the best choice anymore against blue-based control.

[Cabal_chan]

The continuing trend I see in these threads, is that people complain about Tendrills combo decks and then the combo players step up and tell these people that they have to stop complaining, their deck is completely fair. The combo players are just talking in their own interest, they don't want to lose their edge against the field and come up with arguments that the deck is fair because it's skill intensive. They think they are doing well because they are such skillful players, but their judgement is clouded, the deck is just unbeatable for every non FoW deck if the combo player doesn't screw up terribly. Goblins and Zoo are skill intensive as well, but the best player in the world would lose with Zoo against combo, if that pilot is semi decent. Now how does this make the argument that the most skillful player should win the game true?

The continuing trend I see in these threads, is people complain about Tendrils combo decks and then the combo players step up and tell these people that they have to top complaining, their deck isn't 'omgwtfbbqbroken'. The non-combo players are just talking in their own interest, they don't want to lose against combo and come up with arguments that combo is broken because blue decks usually run FoW. They think it's unfair that their deck has to have a bad matchup, but their judgment is clouded yadda yadda yadda.

Edit: It's like the whole Goblin Lackey argument all over again. Guess what? Lackey didn't kill the format. Stop freaking whining.

[Mantis]

The continuing trend I see in these threads, is people complain about Tendrils combo decks and then the combo players step up and tell these people that they have to top complaining, their deck isn't 'omgwtfbbqbroken'. The non-combo players are just talking in their own interest, they don't want to lose against combo and come up with arguments that combo is broken because blue decks usually run FoW. They think it's unfair that their deck has to have a bad matchup, but their judgment is clouded yadda yadda yadda.
And then I went on to explain my comment. You take one paragraph of my post and refute that, but you declined the rest of my posts which basically refutes your argument. Like I said, I don't think it's unfair to have a bad matchup, but I do think it's unfair to have a matchup that simply can't be beat a fair amount of the time unless you have Force of Will. Force of Will requires you to run a number of blue cards and thus all decks have to be based around blue or have an impossible matchup. This in turn punishes deckbuilders and warps the format (not nearly as much as when Flash was around but still, to a large extent).

The Lackey argument is pulled way out of context, Wizard went on to make a host of powerful answers to Lackey and fixed the problem if there ever was one. I am not saying Wizards should ban cards per se, but I am pointing out there is a problem and it needs to be fixed, just like they did with Lackey. If that's through bannings, fine. If they fix it with new cards thats fine too.

[Gheizen64]

The continuing trend I see in these threads, is people complain about Tendrils combo decks and then the combo players step up and tell these people that they have to top complaining, their deck isn't 'omgwtfbbqbroken'. The non-combo players are just talking in their own interest, they don't want to lose against combo and come up with arguments that combo is broken because blue decks usually run FoW. They think it's unfair that their deck has to have a bad matchup, but their judgment is clouded yadda yadda yadda.

Edit: It's like the whole Goblin Lackey argument all over again. Guess what? Lackey didn't kill the format. Stop freaking whining.

Difference is lackey is answerable by every color. Red had burn, white had stp and weenies, blue had countermagic and bounce, black had removal and green got Goyf to trump over goblin (and even before goyf green still used to have a decent matchup against gobs). Lackey is a good creature, but the amount of deck designs constrait it put on deckbuilder isn't even near the design constraint Tendril put on designers, even if gobbo was a *better* (read, more prevalent) deck than storm back then. The format adapted to gobbo with almost no harm, but if adapting to Tendril mean the best aggro deck is blue, then i'd argue there's some problem there.

Also, back then, when people whined, you could say to them (and i told them) to add 1-mana answers and don't whine. When people whine now, you say *go play blue* or just *no one play combo so don't care*.

Again, i'm not advocating a ban to Tendril here, just saying if this is where the format is heading (Madrid->Columbus->?) then i'd advocate a ban on tendril pretty vocally. And mind you, i'd advocate a ban on tendril, not on ritual or LED. As said before, storm decks that win thru creatures (Empty), Mill (Brainfreeze) or are just drastically slower and/or can't use AnT (Dragonstorm, Grapeshot) are fine to me since they're pretty much answerable by much more things than just heavy permission and/or heavy discard.

[swoop]

You're missing the point or just sidetracking volountarily. FoW isn't good against tendril per se, please be reasonable. FoW it's good because it's a free counter against decks that use only stack to win on turn 2-3. Not to say the resources FoW uses are mostly irrilevant against such kind of decks, while against aggressive decks they are most relevant (card advantage, life).

You're saying you see gazillion decks that uses gazillion cards. Lately i checked some tournaments results and it wasn't that kind of meta. Columbus top 8 had 7 decks with blue of which one was a storm deck and a BGW deck with 10 maindecked discard cards (plus 3 extirpate and 3 more duresses in the side) . The deck that won all was an anti-blue deck. Ironically, that was also blue.
I'm not saying we're already at *that* point, but if more and more tourney ends up like this, i feel something should be done. We doesn't care about the Gazillion of decks, we care about the decks that win consistently.

You could also refrain from personal comment when i'm talkin about a pov that's not only mine.

EDIT: ironically, at least in Madrid the anti-blue deck was Zoo (3 Zoo, 2 AnT, 1 Reanimator, 2 countertops). But it look like Zoo can't compete with counterbalance + firespout decks as well as merfolk do. Or maybe the latest trends in going bombs in zoo (elspeth and the like) made the deck not the best choice anymore against blue-based control.

Maybe we should ban firesoupt and counterbalance then, because Zoo can't fight it off.

Or we could ban Force of Will for being a zero mana counterspell which by NO MEANS IS A FREE CARD.
Force of Will is a card disadvantage in its purest form - 2 cards for 1. You can't get any more straightforward
disadvantages on a card that has a single use. To stop a crucial spell. Not to fetch a spell you need, not to
make it playable, but to protect and interupt.

Blue is good, and extremly popular these days, and its easy to splash the colour in every archetype.

Maybe we could ban BLUE or atleast ban all duals with Blue in it, so it would be more difficult to use good cards, that
are meant to be used, because they're printed in the first place, or just plain impossible for a blue deck to win.

Blue went from a single most powerful colour to a single best utility colour (Saito's Merfolks disprove of this, but he's just a master at piloting decks, the deck is not such a breakthrough).


@Mantis: Maybe my metagame is broken or what, but the thing that makes storm good is a good player. TES now days is Fizzling more than ever, Aluren is as you all say (and I pilot it) easily disrupted, even more easily without Recruiters.

Zoo is strong, Blue is strong, Green with Goyfs is strong.. discard is strong, everything is strong and fun to play.
Zoo needs to evolve, every deck is evolving, so what if its putting Elspeth in? Its a good card that kinda cuts in well.

[swoop]

Difference is lackey is answerable by every color. Red had burn, white had stp and weenies, blue had countermagic and bounce, black had removal and green got Goyf to trump over goblin (and even before goyf green still used to have a decent matchup against gobs). Lackey is a good creature, but the amount of deck designs constrait it put on deckbuilder isn't even near the design constraint Tendril put on designers, even if gobbo was a *better* (read, more prevalent) deck than storm back then. The format adapted to gobbo with almost no harm, but if adapting to Tendril mean the best aggro deck is blue, then i'd argue there's some problem there.

Back then, when people whined, you could say to them (and i told them) to add 1-mana answers and don't whine. When people whine now, you say *go play blue* or just *no one play combo so don't care*.

Lets say this. They ban Tendrils. TES puts in Brainfreeze/that goblin spell/grapeshot.

TES puts in Blue shell to protect his goblins.

So what if colour pie is a bit wild now days? if blue is an aggro deck. As FoW is fine, so are Tendrils. There are solutions, if you fear you deck isn't capable of fighting some archetypes. Or some decks just can't beat other decks. Hence "Paper/scissors/lizard/spock/rock.

[Cabal_chan]

And then I went on to explain my comment. You take one paragraph of my post and refute that, but you declined the rest of my posts which basically refutes your argument. Like I said, I don't think it's unfair to have a bad matchup, but I do think it's unfair to have a matchup that simply can't be beat a fair amount of the time unless you have Force of Will. Force of Will requires you to run a number of blue cards and thus all decks have to be based around blue or have an impossible matchup. This in turn punishes deckbuilders and warps the format (not nearly as much as when Flash was around but still, to a large extent).

The Lackey argument is pulled way out of context, Wizard went on to make a host of powerful answers to Lackey and fixed the problem if there ever was one. I am not saying Wizards should ban cards per se, but I am pointing out there is a problem and it needs to be fixed, just like they did with Lackey. If that's through bannings, fine. If they fix it with new cards thats fine too.

Because the rest of your argument isn't worth commenting on. You're talking about the GP when the format hasn't even settled yet. Of course there's a chance that people under/over prepared for combo. 1) Combo lost Mystical, so people may have taken bets on it not showing up. 2) Combo lost Mystical, so people might take bets on people playing it to catch the people who aren't expecting it unawares.

It's like saying the troop surge in Iraq or Obama's healthcare plan should be changed/canceled/whatever because you aren't seeing what you want a month after it started. It's inane and absurd.

" Like I said, I don't think it's unfair to have a bad matchup, but I do think it's unfair to have a matchup that simply can't be beat a fair amount of the time unless you have Force of Will."

That's part of what makes a bad matchup a bad matchup? You lack the cards needed to adequately fight. Some bad matchups are worse than others. You don't see me complaining about CBalance and FoW, even though I hate playing against them.

"The Lackey argument is pulled way out of context, Wizard went on to make a host of powerful answers to Lackey and fixed the problem if there ever was one. "

And Legacy has plenty of answers in several colors to your fictional boogeyman ToA. It seems like people are really digging deep to come up for reasons to nerf it again barely two months after banning Mystical just because they don't like the deck. I don't think the Lackey argument is way out of context, since even then people were complaining about the same deck constraints of 'how many answers do you have to a turn 1 Lackey'.

If storm Tendrils makes a large rash of appearances then sure, I could see the arguments for another nerf. But it really isn't now, is it?

[Piceli89]

FoW stops combos that kill via Tendrils? Seriously?
FoW is one of the weakest cards against Storm Combo. A single Force of Will does not bring anywhere the blue pilot since it will be discarded by Duress or Thoughtseize, or wasted/shutted by Chant or Silence. Or other times, the Storm player will trump you by just playing a fake bomb and the real one, often with the aid of Sensei's Divining Top.
A double Force of Will hand, unless you're already in a good board position with a medium/fast clock, requires you to hold 4 blue cards in hand,i.e. stifling partially your own game development (hold blue cards to feed your countermagic) and use half your hand to play 2 spells.

No one deck that has only Force of Will as a disruption will ever win against Storm Combo. The formula to win against Tendrils is to offer a fast clock and a good mix of disruption, in the terms of Stifle+Waste+Daze+Fow OR CounterTop. If one of these is lacking, it's still at least a tied situation for both the players. With the exception Storm player can wait forever to sculpt his mana and triple protection hands, while the other at certain point will have to tap out to play a win condition (so, not Vendilion Clique), and if it's sorcery speed the other will attempt to go off.

Guess why Merfolk (usually) beats Storm Combo? Because of Cursecatcher, Wasteland and a very fast clock, not because of Fow.
Guess why CounterThopter loses against Storm Combo (at least, I always win that matchup)? Because it has no clock, despites CounterTop and Fow.
And in general, Force of Will is often extremely overrated, as the sacred cow that can't miss in a blue deck or can't be sided out. It's just a card disadvantage counterspell, that works very nicely if you're a really good player and can understand where you can afford or must use it, but it's a dead topdeck in many cases if you don't hold the pitch, and leads to deck designing costraints (the famous 18-22 blue cards).
The point is that games are won by other cards, not by Force of Will. It may be decisive, but in Legacy there are other staples with a sheer power that's far superior to FoW's one. Take Counterbalance and Wild Nacatl, for example.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
So please, let's avoid arguing about your own flawed beliefs. I'm playing Storm Combo since 2 years and I can tell you I'm way more afraid of turn 1 Lackey, turn 2 Piledriver from Goblins or turn 2 Gaddock Teeg from Zoo than of a deck playing only 4 Fows like Counterslivers. I can wait forever and ever if one wants to stop me with Fow, I'm in a hurry when the opponent is going to kill me on turn 3 and I have a slow hand or have to waste resources to get rid of some pesky dork.

[Gheizen64]

Because the rest of your argument isn't worth commenting on. You're talking about the GP when the format hasn't even settled yet. Of course there's a chance that people under/over prepared for combo. 1) Combo lost Mystical, so people may have taken bets on it not showing up. 2) Combo lost Mystical, so people might take bets on people playing it to catch the people who aren't expecting it unawares.

It's like saying the troop surge in Iraq or Obama's healthcare plan should be changed/canceled/whatever because you aren't seeing what you want a month after it started. It's inane and absurd.

" Like I said, I don't think it's unfair to have a bad matchup, but I do think it's unfair to have a matchup that simply can't be beat a fair amount of the time unless you have Force of Will."

That's part of what makes a bad matchup a bad matchup? You lack the cards needed to adequately fight. Some bad matchups are worse than others. You don't see me complaining about CBalance and FoW, even though I hate playing against them.

"The Lackey argument is pulled way out of context, Wizard went on to make a host of powerful answers to Lackey and fixed the problem if there ever was one. "

And Legacy has plenty of answers in several colors to your fictional boogeyman ToA. It seems like people are really digging deep to come up for reasons to nerf it again barely two months after banning Mystical just because they don't like the deck. I don't think the Lackey argument is way out of context, since even then people were complaining about the same deck constraints of 'how many answers do you have to a turn 1 Lackey'.

If storm Tendrils makes a large rash of appearances then sure, I could see the arguments for another nerf. But it really isn't now, is it?

The problem in this line of reasoning is thinking that a deck need to make a big appereance in a format to warp it. This isn't true, and people already posted how in the raffinity days of old, Big Red and green based decks were actually winning more.

Again, non-blue non-black answers to ToA aren't relevant. Unless you've got 12-15 specific hate cards, siding in 4 Mindbreak Traps isn't going to do anything for your storm matchup.

This is a costraint for deckbuilding. If this kind of costraint is too strong or manageable could still be uncertain, but raging only because you refuse to accept the fact that such costraint exist and push the format inevitabily toward blue isn't bringing anyone anywhere.


Lets say this. They ban Tendrils. TES puts in Brainfreeze/that goblin spell/grapeshot.

TES puts in Blue shell to protect his goblins.

So what if colour pie is a bit wild now days? if blue is an aggro deck. As FoW is fine, so are Tendrils. There are solutions, if you fear you deck isn't capable of fighting some archetypes. Or some decks just can't beat other decks. Hence "Paper/scissors/lizard/spock/rock.

TES put in blue shell to protect his goblin. Okay. Adding permission will make, inevitabily, your deck a bit slower. After that, you'll need a storm of 9 and no creature on my side AND a turn to win. So i have more time to search for an answer, or even play turn 1 explosives for 0 with 1 free mana for daze, and you'll have to force it or search for a needle or something. I can have a lifegaining creature that could make the difference in the fight. I could even race with some early creatures + lightning helix. I could run Volcanic fallout or the 2R cicle, 1 damage to all creature card. I could do all this even if i'm not blue or black.
Brainfreeze? I could run one gaea's blessing in my deck. Grapeshot? You'd be so much slower i wouldn't care. Not to say a card like Kor Firewalker could make your life miserable if you use red rituals/tutors. All those cards aren't universal cards, but are also good on their own and can be good in other matchups, differently from, say, Mindbreak Tarps.

Color pie being a "bit" wild is a pretty wide definition. Meta could be healty right now, but T8 Columbus looked a lot like a broken format to me. Let's wait and see. By the way, when is the next big Legacy Tournament?

[Tammit67]

Guess why CounterThopter loses against Storm Combo (at least, I always win that matchup)? Because it has no clock, despites CounterTop and Fow.


Are we talking DDAnT or are we talking TES? Because I like my chances against TES. Storm combo is not an issue when you redundantly have a soft lock on them G2 backed up with Force and counterspell. A win con is not that hard to find, preferably Jace.

The format is fine right now. FoW alone does not do enough against Combo, it is FoW/daze AND CB that keeps it in check, and Day two was full of it. If you dont have tendrils, FoW will still be played because free counters are good. It has real drawbacks that do not always materialize if the game "ends" quickly. Get over it

[Gheizen64]

Are we talking DDAnT or are we talking TES? Because I like my chances against TES. Storm combo is not an issue when you redundantly have a soft lock on them G2 backed up with Force and counterspell. A win con is not that hard to find, preferably Jace.

The format is fine right now. FoW alone does not do enough against Combo, it is FoW/daze AND CB that keeps it in check, and Day two was full of it. If you dont have tendrils, FoW will still be played because free counters are good. It has real drawbacks that do not always materialize if the game "ends" quickly. Get over it

That's exactly what me and other have been saying. Blue is what can beat TES regularly. Blue and just that, sometimes black. FoW is taken as an example most often because it's one of the most representative cards and arguably one of the best card against combo in general.
I don't think anyone here has a problem with Force. Force is a purely reactionary card that isn't even THAT good when paired against fast aggressive decks.

[swoop]

That's exactly what me and other have been saying. Blue is what can beat TES regularly. Blue and just that, sometimes black. FoW is taken as an example most often because it's one of the most representative cards and arguably one of the best card against combo in general.
I don't think anyone here has a problem with Force. Force is a purely reactionary card that isn't even THAT good when paired against fast aggressive decks.

So, Blue based decks have a good chance of beating combo. Black decks have also some chances. so? 2/5ths of the color pie have good odds against a single deck. thats pretty good.



Tarps[/I].

Color pie being a "bit" wild is a pretty wide definition. Meta could be healty right now, but T8 Columbus looked a lot like a broken format to me. Let's wait and see. By the way, when is the next big Legacy Tournament?


How do you mean, 4 Traps aren't gonna do much against Storm? Unless they lock you out via Silence/Chant one trap means alot.

By removing Tendrils, the deck becomes shit. As you have said already, there are alternative kills, which are, in turn to ToA, well, shit.

And Mindbreak Trap is a good card, which is situational. if you want your deck to win over Storm,which you consider a threat, pack it. If you don't, well, DON'T pack it.

You can distrupt tendrils easily without it (I have done so with ALUREN and I don't carry any TRAPS, I did so with New Horizon), you just need to play it smart, not throw cards on the board and scream HULK SMASH MY POKEMON LEVELS UP!!!!!

[Gheizen64]

How do you mean, 4 Traps aren't gonna do much against Storm? Unless they lock you out via Silence/Chant one trap means alot.

By removing Tendrils, the deck becomes shit. As you have said already, there are alternative kills, which are, in turn to ToA, well, shit.

And Mindbreak Trap is a good card, which is situational. if you want your deck to win over Storm,which you consider a threat, pack it. If you don't, well, DON'T pack it.

You can distrupt tendrils easily without it (I have done so with ALUREN and I don't carry any TRAPS, I did so with New Horizon), you just need to play it smart, not throw cards on the board and scream HULK SMASH MY POKEMON LEVELS UP!!!!!

Why you'd suppose storm players are retarded? And again sarcastic remarks about my presumed skill level. This conversation is over for me.

[swoop]

Why you'd suppose storm players are retarded? And again sarcastic remarks about my presumed skill level. This conversation is over for me.

I never wrote that storm players are stupid. I wrote that players playing against storm need to play their plays smart, and carefuly, because
storm can easily FIZZLE.


And I just said once you're strange, nothing about your skill level. Chill dewd

[ktkenshinx]

The consistent lack of evidence-based arguments is really outrageous in this thread. We have seen a variety of arguments ranging from "Storm players just defend their decks because they are invested in them" to "GP Columbus decks are warped into combating Storm". These arguments are either purely theoretical, or they are based in bad facts.

Let's actually look at the sideboard cards in the GP Columbus T8. It has been claimed that way too many slots are dedicated to fighting Storm combo. Is this true? As said before, FoW is a terrible way to stop Storm combo. Other tools, like Canonist, Trap, Thorn, etc. are needed. If these tools are appearing in sideboards in large quantities, then we will have to agree that Storm is warping sideboard choice. If they are not, then we can't say that FoW is specifically targeting combo; it's a damn good card that is good against ALL decks in the format. The sideboard and the specific tools are the things to look at. The following list analyzes what SB cards the players brought to fight Storm. I have been fairly liberal in determining what SB cards would be good against Storm.

Saito: Merfolk
No SB Cards

Martell: CounterTop
2 Spell Pierce
1 Meddling Mage

Ford: Landstill
1 Forbid
1 Mindbreak Trap
1 Stifle

Nelson: BGW Discard
3 Duress (this deck is heavily maindecked against combo, however, with 4 Thoughtseize/2 Gerrard's Verdict/4 Hymn to Tourach)
3 Extirpate

Age: Sneak Attack
3 Blood Moon
2 Spell Pierce

Gosselin: Shelldock Doomsday
2 Extirpate

Durward: Survival Madness
4 Spell Pierce
(3 MD Stifle deserve mention)

Look at these cards. How many of them are EXPLICITLY storm answers? Mindbreak Trap is really it. All of the other cards are good against a huge range of format decks. These decks were no more custom tailored to defeat Storm than they were to defeat any other deck in the format. Saito's lack of Storm answers is particularly telling. As BearAssasin said, Saito claimed that his deck had a poor ANT matchup. But due to MT's banning, he was willing to go a lot lighter on the Storm hatred, because he knew that this deck was hamstrung. As he says in his interview:
"My ANT deck power went very far down. After Madrid I thought about playing ANT again, but Merfolk with Black was better for this GP."

If Storm were as powerful as people are claiming, and the GP Columbus metagame were as warped as people are asserting, then the sideboards would have looked a little different. Force of Will prevalence does NOT in any way indicate an anti-storm deck. FoW is one of the weaker tools to stop Storm-based combo decks. FoW is also incidentally very good and very broken against every deck in the entire format that plays spells. FoW prevalence is not an indicator of storm-dominance, no more than Swords to Plowshares dominance is an indicator of aggro dominance. These are just good cards that people are going to play.

The only serious metagamed deck in this T8 was the discard deck, but I have no idea what its matchups were that day. If it turned out that it beat 5 Storm decks throughout the event and that's what secured its T8 place, then that would be interesting to know. But given the average metgame breakdown, this seems quite unlikely. Nelson's discard spells were good metagame choices against a variety of decks, not JUST combo.

Sideboards and maindecks are where we will see evidence of storm dominance; what cards are there to explicitly mess up ToA? If the answers is "lots", then we have a problem. If the answers is "not many" AND we have a ton of cards that are only circumstantially good against Storm (FoW), then we do not have a problem. This was the case at GP Columbus, and this is also the case in basically all Legacy events following MT's banning.

-ktkenshinx-

[kinda]

Alright, I wanted to preface my question by saying I've never played combo in a tournament (only rb/rw goblins and quinn), since the bias of people against the banning of tendrils was called into question earlier in the thread.


As of GP columbus the vast majority of professional players (and at least the majority on this site) would not even consider playing a deck without black or blue.

Does anyone really think that the banning of tendrils of agony or led would change this?

[Mon,Goblin Chief]

As the basic argument for banning Tendrils seems to boil down to this, pretty much:

The problem here is that adaption doesn't play out equally. Every deck and color archetype had ways to deal with Goblins or Jund (at least post-Worldwake). Tendrils is most like Raffinity in Standard; only 40% of the color pie actually has the ability to deal with it. It's really more like 30%, even, as black just isn't anywhere as effective against Tendrils as blue is.

So you're telling me you can consistently beat Goblins (and Saito-Fish for that matter) with anything that isn't red or White (massive amounts of fast MD-able spotremoval, Moat/Humility or Firespout) outside of faster combo?
There are actually quite a few decks that you simply lose to if you don't run a particular set of colors/a deck geared to hate on those decks if boarding specific SB-hate is out of the question:
- Dredge, LED Dredge in particular (roughly all of them maybe U and R count because of Lavamancer/Cursecatcher and a really fast clock)
- Belcher (exactly the same reasoning as for Tendrils, btw)
- Fish (W/R)
- Goblins (W/R)
- Show and Tell for Emrakul/Progenitus (B/U - not counting Karakas here as running multiple Karakas should only be a consideration in D&T, meaning Chants would suddenly count against Storm because of Quinn and ORing isn't really something you can reasonably MD more than once or twice in a valid deck either)
- Enchantress (GW and U- pridemage and countermagic as usually)
- Survival Vengevine (U and R - FoW, CB and the goldfish provided by playing either Zoo or Goblins)
- Loam, Lands in particular (U and R, CB/B2B and PoP/Blood Moon, respectively)

While the list proves sufficiently that your argument "Tendrils can't be hated MD, so broken" applies to quite a few other things, it also has the side-benefit of answering kinda's question why FoW is what the pros want to play. The reason FoW is such a widely played card lies in the fact that multiple strategies you have to interact with outside of killing creatures do exist (and that is a good thing, imo, having everything be based on creatures is just so boring) and FoW is the only card that can address pretty much all of these problems while not being dead against other decks (and is therefore MD viable). If you want to make a consistent argument that there shouldn't be decks that large parts of the colorwheel can't address sufficiently MD with non-ridiculous cards to win more than once in a while, you end up pretty much with the list from Ari's article, not only Tendrils. And getting rid of all of these cards wouldn't make Legacy a better format, it would make it incredibly boring.

This boils down to: Why is it ok that you need Enchantment and Graveyard-hate if you want to win against a multitude of decks but not that you need to be able to in some way screw with the stack?

Also, Gaddok Teeg is very MDable in my opinion (EE, Jace, Moat, Humility, FOW, Aluren, Natural Order,...), is neither B or U and basically shuts down most storm-combo long enough to kill them, at least MD. Sufficient SB-hate is available, if desired, in basically any color thanks to Chalice and Mindbreak Trap. As for the usual counter-argument "yeah, but than I have to use a large part of my SB for Combo-hate", well tough luck, it's the same for GY hate. Why don't you advocate banning Loam/Dredge-cards?

[JonBarber]

Its amazing how much people whine. Storm is good against aggro decks, yes. But theres plenty of blue decks that keep them under control. And then theres plenty of new horizons decks that keep the blue decks under control. And then theres plenty of zoo decks that keep the new horizons decks under control. And then theres plenty of lands decks that keep zoo decks under control. And then theres plenty of combo decks that keep lands under control. Every competitive deck will have its GOOD matchups and its BAD matchups. Aggro decks, congrats, you lose to tendrils. Go play against some blue decks and goblins to make yourself feel better. Every deck should have a close to unwinnable matchup, its what keeps things balanced. If a deck didn't have a shit poor matchup, everyone would played (I.E. Jund in standard not too long ago). I've often chose to play aggro decks because there was simply too many c/b decks in the meta. When playing goblins, I board 10 cards against lands. Shouldn't loam get banned because I have to do this?

If a deck is doing well in a meta, choose something else that prays upon it. Not an all out, anti-storm deck, but something like new horizons or countertop that use a diverse strategy against a variety of decks.

[Aggro_zombies]

Since when does New Horizons keep Zoo under control? If anything, NH keeps blue decks under control and then loses to Zoo.

[Bryant Cook]

That wasn't his point but thank you for nit picking.

[jazzykat]

It's obvious this format is still too powerful my rec sur deck can't be dusted off yet. Seriously though, we can't even figure out what all the DTB's are yet. I think we should give the format more time before we even discuss this question.

[Gheizen64]

It's obvious this format is still too powerful my rec sur deck can't be dusted off yet. Seriously though, we can't even figure out what all the DTB's are yet. I think we should give the format more time before we even discuss this question.

Lol k. I sincerely hope you're right.

[DarthVicious]

Anything degenerate that shows up will inevitably be kept in check by control decks. If not, I'm sure the metagame will adjust accordingly to keep it under control. Reanimator was just about to be hated out when Mystical got banned. Like JonBarber said, every deck has good and bad matchups. None can completely predict the exact decks they will face at a large tournament, and the strategies for winning a game in Legacy are so varied you pretty much can't predict what will happen on any given turn.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

FoW stops combos that kill via Tendrils? Seriously?
FoW is one of the weakest cards against Storm Combo.

Does anyone actually believe this?

No? Then I won't spend too much time addressing it.

If a deck runs nothing but Force and a 20-turn clock they might have problems with Tendrils. Certainly, the strength of Tendrils decks is that they can fight through even disruption decks. But to argue that Goblins is more likely to beat Tendrils than any given heavily-played FoW-based deck is deceit or ignorance. Based on the sudden tactic of Tendrils-supporters to claim that actually, discard and counters aren't very good against combo, I'm going to go with deceit. The problem is that to swallow this argument you have to have severe brain damage.



Lets say this. They ban Tendrils. TES puts in Brainfreeze/that goblin spell/grapeshot.

Only one of these is viable. And Empty the Warrens, while a truly powerful card, can be answered by every color.



TES puts in Blue shell to protect his goblins.

This seems incredibly unlikely. Good lucking getting a dozen goblins on turn 1 while hanging onto relevant counters.


So what if colour pie is a bit wild now days? if blue is an aggro deck. As FoW is fine, so are Tendrils. There are solutions, if you fear you deck isn't capable of fighting some archetypes. Or some decks just can't beat other decks. Hence "Paper/scissors/lizard/spock/rock.

The so what would be where a 2-color metagame is boring and incestuous.


Because the rest of your argument isn't worth commenting on. You're talking about the GP when the format hasn't even settled yet.

You're saying, what, that a 1000+ person GP isn't relevant data?


That's part of what makes a bad matchup a bad matchup? You lack the cards needed to adequately fight. Some bad matchups are worse than others. You don't see me complaining about CBalance and FoW, even though I hate playing against them.

Literally every color has numerous maindeckable cards that are good against CBalance and counters generally.


And Legacy has plenty of answers in several colors to your fictional boogeyman ToA.

Name them. Tell me what cards are both playable and maindeckable in red, white and green that effectively fight Tendrils. And they have to actually be good against other decks.

Some people made the comparison to Ichorid. The difference here is that Ichorid pretty much folds to graveyard hate which can come in against other matchups. This isn't true for Tendrils outside of blue and black. Cards like Gaddock Teeg or Pyrostatic Pillar might not even hit other combo decks you play against, like Mosswort Bridge or Imperial Painter.


If storm Tendrils makes a large rash of appearances then sure, I could see the arguments for another nerf. But it really isn't now, is it?

Again, we're measuring Tendrils' impact on more than it's own appearances. More information would certainly be helpful, but let us consider what we already have:

Between 2008 and June 2010, there were 7,305 Legacy lists on Deckcheck. Of those, 3,288 ran Force maindeck, 815 ran Thoughtseize or Duress (but neither Force nor Tendrils), and 325 ran Tendrils of Agony. That's 4,428 out of 7,305, or 60% of the metagame defined as part of the Tendrils/Tendrils hate meta.

In the past month there have been 106 Legacy lists, of which 52 were Force-based, 6 were Duress/Thoughtseize decks w/out Force or Tendrils, and 8 were Tendrils. That's 62% of the metagame. It's a slight increase, but banning Mystical Tutor failed to have the desired effect and in fact seems to have worsened the blue-black dominance. This may be attributable to the fact that Reanimator was probably better than Tendrils, and was answerable by every color. Hell, Goblins could be tweaked maindeck to have a good Reanimator matchup.

More information is needed. I'm just spoiling the ending here; Tendrils is the problem, and until it goes away they're going to have to keep shanking innocent victims like M. Tutor.


That wasn't his point but thank you for nit picking.

Oh. See, because here I thought when we're talking about the metagame that basic unawareness of said metagame ruined your credibility.

But I'm not Bryant Cook, I wouldn't know I guess.


whine.

This is a word used by people that don't like to make arguments to describe any complaint or critical observation that anyone makes about anything that they disagree with. As such, when I see it, I stop taking you seriously.

[paK0]

Does anyone actually believe this?

No? Then I won't spend too much time addressing it.

If a deck runs nothing but Force and a 20-turn clock they might have problems with Tendrils. Certainly, the strength of Tendrils decks is that they can fight through even disruption decks. But to argue that Goblins is more likely to beat Tendrils than any given heavily-played FoW-based deck is deceit or ignorance. Based on the sudden tactic of Tendrils-supporters to claim that actually, discard and counters aren't very good against combo, I'm going to go with deceit. The problem is that to swallow this argument you have to have severe brain damage.





Well, he is half right I guess. I'm by no means a very good combo player, but even I can tell that it depends a lot on what kind of deck you are playing. I played DDFT recently and beating Landstill and non CB-Bant decks is in fact easier than beating Goblins. FoW is usable against most Combos, but its effectivity varies depending on what deck you see as "Combo".

The extremes are Belcher and SI. They are cold to Fow, but usually don't give a shit about most other hate, since CB or Teeg will not land before they combo off. DDFT is far more resilent to Countermagic and Discard, but will probably face down hatebears, CB and other nasty stuff that needs time to set up. T.E.S should be somewhere in the middle.

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

To all who say Combo is too broken should define which deck they are talking about. "Tendrils is imba" is both a useless and retardet statement.

[swoop]

@TheInfamousBearAssassin (or: Personwithreallylongnameinvolvingsomethingwith BEARS)


And Legacy has plenty of answers in several colors to your fictional boogeyman ToA.


Name them. Tell me what cards are both playable and maindeckable in red, white and green that effectively fight Tendrils. And they have to actually be good against other decks.

Having a card that counters a single card is ridiculous. You don't need to disrupt ToA per se. You can disrupt his Petals/LED by chalice for 0 or EE for 0.

You can Silence him/Chant him, Extiparate him, Duress him, Therapy him, Hymn him, red can destroy his lands, burn him (holding your burn till he goes low with AdNau, or dunno, doing something else even, is always a possibility.

Kill his mana, destroy his spells, interupting ToA is the last thing you can do before you die.

Hate doesn't need to be universal, so what if Taeg doesn't take against mossworth or painter, you have something else against those cards if you expect it in a field.

Hate against CBtopther isn't good against some other control, like snow queen or something like it.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

@TheInfamousBearAssassin (or: Personwithreallylongnameinvolvingsomethingwith BEARS)

I don't know why you spend time carefully dismantling your own credibility. I suppose it's a fool who looks for logic in the chambers of the human heart.


Having a card that counters a single card is ridiculous. You don't need to disrupt ToA per se. You can disrupt his Petals/LED by chalice for 0 or EE for 0.

Chalice isn't remotely maindeckable in most decks. It's not applicable to most other combo decks, not at zero. And even then you're hitting, what, eight cards out of 60? So an average of 1 deck card in their hand? This isn't any of the criteria asked for.


You can Silence him/Chant him, Extiparate him, Duress him, Therapy him, Hymn him, red can destroy his lands, burn him (holding your burn till he goes low with AdNau, or dunno, doing something else even, is always a possibility.

Silence and Orim's Chant aren't generally maindeckable without some Scepter build. Extirpate isn't particularly effective without other discard. Duress, Hymn, THerapy, etc., don't fit the criteria of being outside of the blue-black combo waste land.


Hate doesn't need to be universal, so what if Taeg doesn't take against mossworth or painter, you have something else against those cards if you expect it in a field.

Like the cards that are good in other matchups. Although Gaddock is still probably the closest to a maindeckable answer outside of blue/black.


Well, he is half right I guess. I'm by no means a very good combo player, but even I can tell that it depends a lot on what kind of deck you are playing. I played DDFT recently and beating Landstill and non CB-Bant decks is in fact easier than beating Goblins. FoW is usable against most Combos, but its effectivity varies depending on what deck you see as "Combo".

DDFT is cute, but I'm not sure if an ultra-evolved version of Tendrils that's designed to beat the hate decks actually counters the trend. Variants of Tendrils and Force decks chasing each other around the mulberry bush doesn't get us anywhere. Generally speaking, blue decks beat Tendrils decks, and there are measures and counter-measures that can be taken on both sides to try and address this.


The extremes are Belcher and SI. They are cold to Fow, but usually don't give a shit about most other hate, since CB or Teeg will not land before they combo off. DDFT is far more resilent to Countermagic and Discard, but will probably face down hatebears, CB and other nasty stuff that needs time to set up. T.E.S should be somewhere in the middle.

I think TES, and ANT before it, are better examples of the problem. Their matchups vary from "insanely good" to "modestly bad". Even the hate decks have to draw a good combination of hate and threats in order to win here.

[JonBarber]

In the past month there have been 106 Legacy lists, of which 52 were Force-based, 6 were Duress/Thoughtseize decks w/out Force or Tendrils, and 8 were Tendrils.

Holy shit, 8 tendrils decks?! I didn't realize how broken the format was. THANK GOD those 52 other decks we're ready with their combo specific hate. I'm sure they all played force of will because they were so worried about those 8 tendrils decks that were being played.

You know whats really breaking the format? Goblin lackey, he's insane. Hes really making the game unfun. Therefore, people are forced to play swords to plowshares or path to exile because it takes care of him.

Between 2008 and June 2010, there were 7,305 Legacy lists on Deckcheck. Of those, 5,150 ran swords to plowshares or path to exile. That's 5,150 out of 7,305, or 70% of the metagame defined as part of the goblin lackey hate meta.




I think TES, and ANT before it, are better examples of the problem. Their matchups vary from "insanely good" to "modestly bad". Even the hate decks have to draw a good combination of hate and threats in order to win here.

If this was even remotely true, EVERYONE would play it. Any deck that is that favored to win in a competitive environment would dominate. Why play anything else? Obviously its got good matchups and BAD matchups. Try playing the deck.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

Holy shit, 8 tendrils decks?! I didn't realize how broken the format was. THANK GOD those 52 other decks we're ready with their combo specific hate. I'm sure they all played force of will because they were so worried about those 8 tendrils decks that were being played.

So, do you read threads before posting? Or were you just one of those kids that was constantly told how smart you were growing up, so you just assume you'll get the gist of the conversation via electircal osmosis, and you just start wailing away at the keyboard because reading and understanding what has gone before is for chumps?


You know whats really breaking the format? Goblin lackey, he's insane. Hes really making the game unfun. Therefore, people are forced to play swords to plowshares or path to exile because it takes care of him.

If the only cards that dealt with Goblin Lackey were StP and PtE then yes, he would be insane.


If this was even remotely true, EVERYONE would play it. Any deck that is that favored to win in a competitive environment would dominate. Why play anything else? Obviously its got good matchups and BAD matchups. Try playing the deck.

Uh, yes, it has good matchups and bad matchups. But the good matchups are a lot more good than the bad matchups are bad. This still may not make it the optimal deck if the marginally bad matchups make up 50% of the field. Or it may be optimal and people simply aren't choosing to play it. Efficient market theory isn't something people that know what they're talking about use as an argument.

[Mon,Goblin Chief]

Does anyone actually believe this?

Name them. Tell me what cards are both playable and maindeckable in red, white and green that effectively fight Tendrils. And they have to actually be good against other decks.

Some people made the comparison to Ichorid. The difference here is that Ichorid pretty much folds to graveyard hate which can come in against other matchups. This isn't true for Tendrils outside of blue and black. Cards like Gaddock Teeg or Pyrostatic Pillar might not even hit other combo decks you play against, like Mosswort Bridge or Imperial Painter.



Again, we're measuring Tendrils' impact on more than it's own appearances. More information would certainly be helpful, but let us consider what we already have:

Between 2008 and June 2010, there were 7,305 Legacy lists on Deckcheck. Of those, 3,288 ran Force maindeck, 815 ran Thoughtseize or Duress (but neither Force nor Tendrils), and 325 ran Tendrils of Agony. That's 4,428 out of 7,305, or 60% of the metagame defined as part of the Tendrils/Tendrils hate meta.

In the past month there have been 106 Legacy lists, of which 52 were Force-based, 6 were Duress/Thoughtseize decks w/out Force or Tendrils, and 8 were Tendrils. That's 62% of the metagame. It's a slight increase, but banning Mystical Tutor failed to have the desired effect and in fact seems to have worsened the blue-black dominance. This may be attributable to the fact that Reanimator was probably better than Tendrils, and was answerable by every color. Hell, Goblins could be tweaked maindeck to have a good Reanimator matchup.

More information is needed. I'm just spoiling the ending here; Tendrils is the problem, and until it goes away they're going to have to keep shanking innocent victims like M. Tutor.

It seems you prefer ignoring the posts that actually present supported arguments that contradict your position. Keep picking your fights as wisely and you'll clearly win this debate.
It's not only Ichorid. Ignoring fast combo - which you want to be rid off and rather consist of a whole deck than simply cards - name maindeckable cards outside of Blue and Red that can actually beat Lands (Loam). Name maindeckable cards outside of white and red that will actually allow you to consistently beat Goblins and Fish. Name decks without blue or red that can actually reasonably beat Vengivne Survival MD. What about maindeckable answers to Enchantress outside of blue and greenwhite (both colors together, nonetheless). Or to stay with Blue and Black, name maindeckable cards in the other colors that will allow you to beat Belcher. And this is not even taking the fact into acount that we would have to look for cards that turn these matchups around for decks THAT HAVE CHOSEN TO COMPLETELY IGNORE ONE PART OF THE METAGAME! Tendrils is NOT the problem here.

The omnipresence of FoW is not caused by Tendrils. It's caused by the fact that it is the one answer that fits almost any problem and is usefull even against decks that don't have keycards. That's why it's so good and why so many people want to run it. That and the power of Brainstorm. Once you've committed to run Brainstorm and therefore blue, why outside of very strong design constraints (see LED) would you not include the one card that can keep the opponent's extremely powerful cards from putting the game away without being a liability against the field?
Honestly, the reason pretty much any deck I built starts with 4 Brainstorm 4 Force of Will is that Brainstorm is just so good at reducing randomness and FoW means I get an answer to whatever their plan is. I never approach this from the point of view "oh man, if I don't run FoW I'll lose to Tendrils combo." It's more like "damn, if I don't run FoW they're gonna ruin me with turn 1-2 Aether Vial/Survival/Show and Tell/Intuition->Loam/Blood Moon/Argothian Enchantress/Sylvan Library/a thousand other things or drop something lethal on me whenever I tap out after turn 2." Equating the high presence of FoW to Tendrils is missing how Legacy works completely.

[Bryant Cook]

Oh. See, because here I thought when we're talking about the metagame that basic unawareness of said metagame ruined your credibility.

But I'm not Bryant Cook, I wouldn't know I guess.

I had no stance on the argument. All I was saying was that his argument about New Horizons wasn't relevant to the point Jon Barber was making about a Rock/Paper/Scissors metagame.

Although, I believe I have more of an understanding of metagames since I actually play magic. Not just crazy theories with terrible rants backing them up.

[ktkenshinx]

Again, we're measuring Tendrils' impact on more than it's own appearances. More information would certainly be helpful, but let us consider what we already have:

Between 2008 and June 2010, there were 7,305 Legacy lists on Deckcheck. Of those, 3,288 ran Force maindeck, 815 ran Thoughtseize or Duress (but neither Force nor Tendrils), and 325 ran Tendrils of Agony. That's 4,428 out of 7,305, or 60% of the metagame defined as part of the Tendrils/Tendrils hate meta.

Most of the time, a deck is considered dominant or format warping when it posts results on its own. There is a secondary definition of such a deck, and that is a deck that warps other card-choices. This seems to me the crux of the argument. No one here is contending that Tendrils is dominating events. Instead, people are saying that Storm-based combo is dictating card-choices in other decks. Thus, it is format warping.
The chief culprit in this argument has become Force of Will, with his accomplices being Duress and Thoughtseize. As TIBA explains, these cards are BOTH good at stopping combo and maindeckable (unlike Mindbreak Trap/Ethersworn Canonist which, while good in SB’s, are terrible in the maindeck, and thus do not indicate a warped format).

So the question we need to ask is “Does a lot of FoW/Duress/Thoughtseize indicate an unhealthy, combo-warped metagame?

The answer is no, because FoW is just a good card. Even though it helps the combo matchup, it also helps all matchups. So we can’t just blame its appearance and prevalence on combo.

When you think about it, this really is a bad question because of FoW’s inclusion on that list. FoW is just a damn good card. It’s a broken counterspell, as far as counterspells go (Drain excepted), and blue has so many other cards and strategies to support it. FoW is going to see heavy, heavy play in any metagame that has spells worth countering. Given that every metagame in Magic’s history would have appropriate FoW victims, then this really seems to stop the inquiry dead in its tracks. FoW is omnipresent because it is so darn good. Sure, it slows down combo and helps fight it. But it also does the same to basically every other deck in the format with a few narrow exceptions. FoW stops other FoWs, thereby protecting your own spells. It creates tempo blowouts. It stops big bad threats. It counter pivotal cards. FoW is just so useful that we cannot reasonably say “combo’s presence is the reason that we see so much FoW”. That’s a ridiculous statement because of all the other hundreds of contributing reasons to FoW’s inclusion in decks.

Discard, however, is a different animal. I agree that discard spells, especially Duress, are more aimed at combo players than at other decks. Sure, they also help in a lot of matchups, but unlike FoW, they disproportionately hinder combo decks before all else. I agree that looking at discard’s prevalence is a good indicator of combo’s format warping nature. After all, the discard deck would then become a good metagame choice to crush all the upstart storm players in their tracks (reference the GP Columbus list packing 4 MD Hymn to Tourach). So how many such decks are really showing up in Legacy?

In the past month there have been 106 Legacy lists, of which 52 were Force-based, 6 were Duress/Thoughtseize decks w/out Force or Tendrils, and 8 were Tendrils. That's 62% of the metagame. It's a slight increase, but banning Mystical Tutor failed to have the desired effect and in fact seems to have worsened the blue-black dominance. This may be attributable to the fact that Reanimator was probably better than Tendrils, and was answerable by every color. Hell, Goblins could be tweaked maindeck to have a good Reanimator matchup.

In 2010, there were approximately 65 decks that played Duress in the maindeck and did not also play Tendrils of Agony or Reanimate. This includes early 2010, when MT, Entomb, Ad Nauseam, and Tendrils were definitely causing some format issues (not necessarily serious ones, but issues nonetheless). Similarly, about 90 decks ran Hymn to Tourach in the maindeck (a pretty brutal metagame call against a combo player). But over 180 decks ran Wild Nacatl in that same time period. Over 130 played with Goblin Lackey. Almost 200 were using Lord of Atlantis. Those are a lot of deck representatives that do not pack explicitly maindecked combo/storm hatred.

I am willing to concede that Duress/Hymn presence might be the sign of a slightly warped format (especially before MT’s banning). But those decks do not appear in any serious abundance when compared to all the dozens of other playable Legacy archetypes this year. This becomes even more true after July.

As to FoW, it is way too biased to say that “FoW’s presence indicates combo heavy metagames.” FoW has just so many other applications and uses to claim this with any certainty.

I appreciate that TIBA brought some evidence to the argument here. It would be nice if others could offer the same, as it would help progress the discussion towards some sort of conclusion instead of an “I’m wrong because I said so” festival.
-ktkenshinx-

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

It seems you prefer ignoring the posts that actually present supported arguments that contradict your position. Keep picking your fights as wisely and you'll clearly win this debate.

And here I thought I was in fact responding to the posts of a half dozen people by myself. But maybe that's just because I'm not retarded. Let me know what brilliant arguments you think I was dodging, chief.


It's not only Ichorid. Ignoring fast combo - which you want to be rid off and rather consist of a whole deck than simply cards -

Does not compute.


name maindeckable cards outside of Blue and Red that can actually beat Lands (Loam).

Wasteland, Pithing Needle, Relic of Progenitus, StP, Withered Wretch, Troll Ascetic, Loaming Shaman. Reanimating/Retaining an Iona or Emrakul. Lands is a deck with several gameplans, so it's difficul to tell what you mean here exactly, but each individual element in the deck can be answered. In fact, Lands is scariest when you are running lots of colors and thus more vulnerable to recurring Wasteland. Maze of Ith, Mishra's Factory and a Tabernacle aren't an impossibly large hurdle to overcome for any deck that has this as a serious concern entering the tournament.


Name maindeckable cards outside of white and red that will actually allow you to consistently beat Goblins and Fish.

Removal spells. Particularly removal spells that distribute. Umezawa's Jitte, SoFI, Contagion, more or bigger creatures. Fish is easy to beat if you don't run blue.


Name decks without blue or red that can actually reasonably beat Vengivne Survival MD.

P. Needle, any kind of sufficient creature removal, including StP and PtE, discard, Relic, Jitte, Damnation, Wrath of God, Humility, the old recurring an Iona/Emrakul trick. Almost every deck has ways to answer Survival into Vengevine.


What about maindeckable answers to Enchantress outside of blue and greenwhite (both colors together, nonetheless).

Discard takes a pretty heavy toll on Enchantress. I guess if you're playing monored you're stuck.


Or to stay with Blue and Black, name maindeckable cards in the other colors that will allow you to beat Belcher.

EE, Powder Keg, Firespout, Burning Wish, Moment's Peace, Tabernacle, Pithing Needle, any kind of removal/life gain comboed into Wrath of God. Ghostly Prison.


And this is not even taking the fact into acount that we would have to look for cards that turn these matchups around for decks THAT HAVE CHOSEN TO COMPLETELY IGNORE ONE PART OF THE METAGAME! Tendrils is NOT the problem here.

I'm not sure what this sentence means.


The omnipresence of FoW is not caused by Tendrils. It's caused by the fact that it is the one answer that fits almost any problem and is usefull even against decks that don't have keycards. That's why it's so good and why so many people want to run it. That and the power of Brainstorm. Once you've committed to run Brainstorm and therefore blue, why outside of very strong design constraints (see LED) would you not include the one card that can keep the opponent's extremely powerful cards from putting the game away without being a liability against the field?

Brainstorm + Force is obviously good, and has been since forever. I don't propose banning it, but I do propose using it as a metric. If more than half of the top 8 of a Legacy tournament consistently involves these two cards, something is wrong in the metagame.

My proposal is simple; other colors should have a fighting chance against the best combo. If they don't, the format needs to be retinkered.

[kinda]

Brainstorm + Force is obviously good, and has been since forever. I don't propose banning it, but I do propose using it as a metric. If more than half of the top 8 of a Legacy tournament consistently involves these two cards, something is wrong in the metagame.

My proposal is simple; other colors should have a fighting chance against the best combo. If they don't, the format needs to be retinkered.

Wizards can't print an all purpose answer like force of will or even thoughtseize in rwg...those colors don't have counters or discard. If you want an all purpose answer you run blue or black...if you want akward conditional answers run the other colors.

[Gheizen64]

Wizards can't print an all purpose answer like force of will or even thoughtseize in rwg...those colors don't have counters or discard. If you want an all purpose answer you run blue or black...if you want akward conditional answers run the other colors.

Because the other colors are handicapped? If the best combo in the format were Hermit, i'm pretty sure we would see a lot more differents decks/colors in T8. And not only because Storm hate out physically those decks. I honestly believe that a big reason is that when you design and choose a deck, you don't want to have a matchup that's an auto-loss and you want to able to fight every match without relying too much on the luck of the pairing. Saito said it himself, he considered playing Merfolk or AnT before Columbus and then, seeing more countertops than Zoo, he did go Merfolk. Guess why? Those two decks, can, on good day and with a good pilot, beat any other deck. The same can't be said of any non-blue/black deck. If you want to win a tournament, you can't afford to have an auto-loss matchup out of even 5% of the field.
Also, yes FoW would be played anyway even without storm and yes fow is good and yes and all. No one is denying that. But honestly, seeing so many fows + discard raise my eyebrows.

And besides, everyone is dodging the point, that is there's a main difference between tendril and non-tendril based combo decks. If enchantress did dominate for example, you would need just to splash green for a sideboarded new 1G tranquility , play counterspells, discard or any kind of white enchantment removal. If land dominated, you could attack the deck from many differents angles, from his recursion, to his basic strategy of hosing non-basic by playing monocolor, by using counterspells or simply hate cards from pretty much any color. When a storm deck dominate, you can't simply splash FoW and daze and hope to do something, because storm decks are strong against light permission or light discard. Also, FoW require 18 blue cards in your deck to work. It's a different level of constraint on design imho.

[morgan_coke]

Actually, monored has flaring pain and Leyline of Punishment and everlasting torment as answers to enchantress, and thats just off the top of my head.

[kinda]

Because the other colors are handicapped? If the best combo in the format were Hermit, i'm pretty sure we would see a lot more differents decks/colors in T8. And not only because Storm hate out physically those decks. I honestly believe that a big reason is that when you design and choose a deck, you don't want to have a matchup that's an auto-loss and you want to able to fight every match without relying too much on the luck of the pairing. Saito said it himself, he considered playing Merfolk or AnT before Columbus and then, seeing more countertops than Zoo, he did go Merfolk. Guess why? Those two decks, can, on good day and with a good pilot, beat any other deck. The same can't be said of any non-blue/black deck. If you want to win a tournament, you can't afford to have an auto-loss matchup out of even 5% of the field.
Also, yes FoW would be played anyway even without storm and yes fow is good and yes and all. No one is denying that. But honestly, seeing so many fows + discard raise my eyebrows.

And besides, everyone is dodging the point, that is there's a main difference between tendril and non-tendril based combo decks. If enchantress did dominate for example, you would need just to splash green for a sideboarded new 1G tranquility , play counterspells, discard or any kind of white enchantment removal. If land dominated, you could attack the deck from many differents angles, from his recursion, to his basic strategy of hosing non-basic by playing monocolor, by using counterspells or simply hate cards from pretty much any color. When a storm deck dominate, you can't simply splash FoW and daze and hope to do something, because storm decks are strong against light permission or light discard. Also, FoW require 18 blue cards in your deck to work. It's a different level of constraint on design imho.

The other colors are handicapped in eternal...that's kinda the whole point.

Hm, I think we either need to ban Underground Sea or Saito...one of those is definately too powerful.

You're right having auto-losses is unacceptable...so in legacy you have to run blue or black because of this. You can also run zoo though since so many people run it, it's likely someone does well with it, :smile:.

No one is dodging that point...I addressed it earlier. And as Goblin and I have said force of will and thoutseize are still the only catch all answers...if tendrils is banned you're still going to need thoughtseize or force for all of the other non-permanent problem spells that rgw can't deal with in any one card.

[AriLax]

Saito's analysis is not the standard one. If you think Merfolk doesn't have a good ANT matchup I'd like to know what you think does.


Saito is right. The standard Merfolk deck is a solid dog to Storm. Stifle versions might do better, but I'm unsure.

Re: Whoever was asking about Brad Nelson's GWB attrition deck's record vs. Storm:

I tested against him before the event. I was up 4-1 and we agreed the match up was A) not worth playing more and B) pretty favorable for me.

[Mon,Goblin Chief]

And here I thought I was in fact responding to the posts of a half dozen people by myself. But maybe that's just because I'm not retarded. Let me know what brilliant arguments you think I was dodging, chief.

You were not in fact answering post from multiple people single-handedly. Even though you might be under the impression that it actually is considered answering to repeat the same rant multiple times, it is not. Answering means looking critically at the actual counterarguments the other side makes and disproving them. As such addressing one of the few posts that actually addressed your argument with a counterargument might have been a better course of action that repeating what you had been saying for a few pages. Considering that you seem to not have grasped my point even though you have quoted quite a few lines of my post this time, I'll be glad to reiterate. My "brilliant argument" (wouldn't be my choice of words, I rather think it is a pretty simple observation) is that Tendrils is not the only deck that does retarded stuff to the point that in many cases 3 colors are unable to have actually maindeckable solutions and that FoWs presence is not predicated on Tendrils but on the fact that there are a ton of decks that do retarded stuff in Legacy.



Does not compute.

It's rather simple, really. Considering that you were looking for maindeckable cards that most parts of the color-pie could use to fight storm-combo and didn't find any, I proposed the counterexperiment of looking for other decks that might create a similar situation. I excluded fast combo as an option for the other colors as fast combo is not something that would let decks of other colors compete reasonably by metagaming but only by being forced into morphing into a very particular deck - I only shortened it to "as combo-decks are not single cards but whole decks". Excuse me for having been so incosiderate as to not have spelled this out in enough detail for every member of the human race to have understood it without thinking about it for more than 10 seconds.



Wasteland, Pithing Needle, Relic of Progenitus, StP, Withered Wretch, Troll Ascetic, Loaming Shaman. Reanimating/Retaining an Iona or Emrakul. Lands is a deck with several gameplans, so it's difficul to tell what you mean here exactly, but each individual element in the deck can be answered. In fact, Lands is scariest when you are running lots of colors and thus more vulnerable to recurring Wasteland. Maze of Ith, Mishra's Factory and a Tabernacle aren't an impossibly large hurdle to overcome for any deck that has this as a serious concern entering the tournament.

And here I was under the impression we were talking reasonable MD cards - as in "cards I might actually want in my deck against anything but lands". Once you reach Troll Ascetic and Withered Wretch as a playable cards, you're really hard pressed to find cards that don't qualify as maindeckable.
As for the reasonable cards, Wasteland is nice and dandy but does about as much against lands as it does against storm - it wins you a game once in a long while.
Pithing Needle is a great card but the only deck maindecking it regularly is in my experience Enlightened Tutor Control as a 1-of. In anything else people don't seem to consider it suitable for MD play because it's impact against the metagame at large is too low, quite similar to Chalice against storm actually. Therefore it suddenly being played in large numbers in maindecks would rather indicate a warped metagame, don't you think?
Relic of Progenitus is suffering the same fate. It should be great in a metagame with Loam, Goyf, Ichorid and Academy Ruins but people don't maindeck it. Now that is weird. May we be picking up a trend here? Something along the lines "people don't md hate for a deck they might run into once in a while that doesn't do anything very useful against other decks?"
And while I fully agree StP is an excellent MD card, what exactly does it do against an even half-way competent lands pilot outside of White Weenie or other decks with 5+ basic plains?



Removal spells. Particularly removal spells that distribute. Umezawa's Jitte, SoFI, Contagion, more or bigger creatures. Fish is easy to beat if you don't run blue.

I admit you got me here with Jitte, point taken. Contagion is something that would only be a reasonable maindeck playable in a warped metagame full of tribal decks and therefore doesn't qualify. Finally the "more and bigger creatures" approach hasn't been working out for me against either deck as long as you aren't running a ton of removal in addition to said creatures (and therefore white or red in the MD as all the removal spells in other colors don't really cut it in large enough numbers).



P. Needle, any kind of sufficient creature removal, including StP and PtE, discard, Relic, Jitte, Damnation, Wrath of God, Humility, the old recurring an Iona/Emrakul trick. Almost every deck has ways to answer Survival into Vengevine.

For Needle and Relic, see Lands. As for sufficient creature removal, trying to beat it on a creature-removal front has proven pretty pointless to me even though I admit Humility would work if you get it down through Daze, FoW and mana-denial before the first time 2+ Vengevines enter play. Winning through getting Iona/Emrakul is hurt by the same problem (and Iona works quite well against Tendrils, too, if you ignore the time-constraints created by the opposing deck as you have to if you want to use it to beat Vengevine-Survival).



Discard takes a pretty heavy toll on Enchantress. I guess if you're playing monored you're stuck.

I even mentioned "both colors at the same time" to make sure it's clear I don't mean decks that are only either white or green. Discard sounds like it might be a viable answer, though, even though it seems unlikely considering a single Enchantress-effect has a tendency to negate its impact very rapidly. But accepting that point, Blue decks, black decks and green-white decks get cards that interact with Enchantress. Considering that this includes the color that gets to interact with pretty much everything thanks to FoW, this doesn't seem like the most remarkable improvement on the two colors that can disrupt Tendrils well. Not to mention I'm being generous here as Pridemage, the one cards that allows for green-white decks to make the list, is about as maindeckable as Gaddok Teeg.



EE, Powder Keg, Firespout, Burning Wish, Moment's Peace, Tabernacle, Pithing Needle, any kind of removal/life gain comboed into Wrath of God. Ghostly Prison.
While some ofl these cards are solid against the Warrens kill, only Needle addresses Belcher itself and that is not, in the current metagame, an actual MD card (see lands). Powder Keg is pretty much unplayble, Firespout is too slow at least half the time - especially if you're not running FoW which seems to be the point behind your problem with Tendrils - and so are Burning Wish and Wrath (you would need a pretty weird deck to be able to combine removal and lifegain for enough to get to Wrath-mana before dieing, too). Moments Peace doesn't seem to be played at all and I therefore stipulate that it shouldn't count as a maindeckable card. Ghostly Prison falls under your own rule for Chalice - it only gets played in weird prison decks. Actually, most of the cards you mention to answer for the decks I mentioned seem to see a lot less MD play than Chalice does now that I think about it.




I'm not sure what this sentence means.

Another excuse for having spelled out everything in nice little easily understood packets seems to be in order here. I hope I can correct my failings now. What I was trying to say was that, to make the proposed counter-experiment actually fair, we would have to look for a few maindeckable cards that beat the decks I mentioned and than to graft these cards into other decks that have chosen to make their gameplan ignoring the particular strategies the listed decks employ in their original deck-construction (as most non-blue non-black decks do for combo).
An example would be Mono-Blue with nothing but countermagic, carddraw and a few winconditions trying to find a few silver-bullets to beat Mishra's Factory. Mono-Blue has chosen to only control the stack while ignoring anything that actually hits the board. As such it's ability to deal with something that ignores the stack is severely compromised and now it needs silver-bullets against this scenario. The situation is the same for your typical aggro-deck against storm-combo. They have decided to only control creatures and if the opponent isn't impressed by that, they need some form of hate they can put MD to solve the issue. The necessary impact of what could be considered sufficient hate is understandably magnified.
I didn't follow through with this thought-experiment because for some reason people don't do this, they only tend to ignore stack-based interaction, which in turn magnifies the effect of storm-combo compared to some of the decks I mention because people at least feel like they get to interact with Enchantress because they are running four Pridemages, not that that usually changes much.



Brainstorm + Force is obviously good, and has been since forever. I don't propose banning it, but I do propose using it as a metric. If more than half of the top 8 of a Legacy tournament consistently involves these two cards, something is wrong in the metagame.

My proposal is simple; other colors should have a fighting chance against the best combo. If they don't, the format needs to be retinkered.
Now, this is exactly where I have problems with your argument
a) Force of Will and Brainstorm are simply very good, meaning even if there is not a single combo-deck in the metagame you would see them in top 8s. Brainstorm alone is actually good enough that it would skew median top 8 penetration in the direction of blue if there isn't a strategy that is particularly dominant against blue, and Brainstorms usually make FoWs enter decks.
b) Tendrils is far from the only deck that makes Force of Will so important to have in your deck because other answers to a large number of otherwise degenerate strategies aren't maindeckable because they are to narrow.
c) People are not playing with FoW just for fear of the Tendrils-boogeyman, otherwise we would see far more Relics and Needles in maindecks to fight Loam or Ruins-EE as well as tons of Krosan Grips against CB-Top.
d) FoW-decks aren't heavily represented in Top 8s because they pray on combo, simply because there isn't much combo in most metagames to pray on, it's because the decks are legitimately good against quite a lot of decks.
e) The quality of Force of Will is largely dependant on the fact that there are so many decks out there in the Legacy metagame. If you can't be sure what you will play against, having a flexible spell that will serve in any matchup and be active from the very beginning of the game is a big edge in and off itself, no need for some big villain combo-deck to make it good and place very well.

All these points make it ridiculous to use the presence of Force of Will (and much less FoW + Brainstorm) as an indicator that combo is too good. It is only an indicator of a) Force of Will being a great all-around answer b) Legacy allowing for ridiculous things to happen early in the game and c) the fact that there are so many different kinds of threats in Legacy that having one card that covers most of them while not being dead against anything is powerful enough to both push any deck that can to use it and propel decks that have it to place well.
It might also be an indicator of good players being more likely to want to play blue, but that is pure speculation and I only propose it as another possible explanation not my actual point of view.

[emidln]

Saito is right. The standard Merfolk deck is a solid dog to Storm. Stifle versions might do better, but I'm unsure.

Re: Whoever was asking about Brad Nelson's GWB attrition deck's record vs. Storm:

I tested against him before the event. I was up 4-1 and we agreed the match up was A) not worth playing more and B) pretty favorable for me.

Saito's analysis is the same that any experienced storm pilot (which he has become) makes. Merfolk is technically demanding but easy to win even without dedicated hate like Xantid Swarm, and a storm pilot packing Xantid Swarm actively wants to play against Merfolk.

[1carus]

You know whats really breaking the format? Goblin lackey, he's insane. He's really making the game unfun. Therefore, people are forced to play swords to plowshares or path to exile because it takes care of him.

I'm surprised nobody mentioned Aether Vial here which is obviously broken in at least 3 aggro decks. Based of previous arguments, Aether Vial has to be banned, as it allows you to do crazy stuff way too early in the game. As long as you have a creature in hand, you can sidestep the land drop based tempo system and effectively get a free, resuable, one-sided Show and Tell, that also makes your creatures undisruptable by a Force of Will. Now isn't that too overpowered?

[Amon Amarth]

Saito's analysis is the same that any experienced storm pilot (which he has become) makes. Merfolk is technically demanding but easy to win even without dedicated hate like Xantid Swarm, and a storm pilot packing Xantid Swarm actively wants to play against Merfolk.

This.

Once you Duress/TS out FoW the only question Merfolk asks if you can pay a little more for your spells. In a deck with 30-ish mana sources that's not too hard.

[ummon]

I'm surprised nobody mentioned Aether Vial here which is obviously broken in at least 3 aggro decks. Based of previous arguments, Aether Vial has to be banned, as it allows you to do crazy stuff way too early in the game. As long as you have a creature in hand, you can sidestep the land drop based tempo system and effectively get a free, resuable, one-sided Show and Tell, that also makes your creatures undisruptable by a Force of Will. Now isn't that too overpowered?

You can't play a creature using Aether Vial before you could play it using lands. It might accelerate your playing, but that is a long term gain that is not realized immediately. Goblin lackey is somewhat faster, and is certainly beyond the power level of most cards, but it doesn't take effect until turn 2 and has so many answers to it (like blocking it), that it doesn't merit a ban. Similarly, Survival and Wild Nacatl do not have a crazy effect on turn 1 or 2.

LED on the other hand, is not like these cards. With a LED, you can do a lot that you wouldn't otherwise be able to do.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

So many posts, so little time. I'm going to break down my replies into general points that address most of the points being raised repeatedly.

1) Any comparison of Tendrils to any card that has colorless answers or answers in 3-4 colors, if not all five, is irrelevant to the discussion.

2) Any argument that it's reasonable to have to play blue or black is contrary to the wishes of most players in the format and to Wizards' policy towards bannings.

3) Any argument lacking in evidence and resorting to status quo bias deserves to be ignored.

4) Anyone who says that blue and black spells don't hurt (insert Tendrils build here) needs to explain what does beat said list, and/or why a supposedly unbeatable Tendrils list, barring a few narrow sideboard cards, isn't in fact an argument for banning the card.


Between 2008 and June 2010, there were 7,305 Legacy lists on Deckcheck. Of those, 5,150 ran swords to plowshares or path to exile. That's 5,150 out of 7,305, or 70% of the metagame defined as part of the goblin lackey hate meta.

Actually, Deck Check registers it as 2,374, out of 7,143. Or 33.2%. Path to Exile or StP got played in 5,079 decks over that time period out of all formats.

Actually, I've crunched the numbers further and have to revise my prior opinion.

According to Deck Check:

Between January 1 2005 and December 31 2006:

491 decks placed at a Legacy tournament
197 decks, or 40.1%, ran Force
73 decks, or 14.9%, ran Duress to the exclusion of Force or Tendrils (Thoughtseize not yet being in print)
only 6 decks, or 1.2%, ran Tendrils of Agony

Total: 56.2%

Between January 1 2007, and December 31 2008, excluding all decks playing Protean Hulk (although the inclusion of the Flash metagame period will still tilt these numbers somewhat):

3,387 decks placed at a Legacy tournament
1,485 decks, or 43.8%, ran Force
471 decks, or 13.9%, ran Duress or Thoughtseize without either FoW or ToA.
96 decks, or 2.8%, ran Tendrils of Agony

Total: 60.5%

From January 1 to December 31, 2009:

3,153 decks placed at a Legacy tournament
1,411 decks, or 44.8%, ran Force
343 decks, or 10.9%, ran Duress or Thoughtseize but neither FoW nor ToA
152 decks, or 4.8%, ran Tendrils of Agony

Total: 60.5%

From January 1 to present, 2010:

2,046 decks placed at a Legacy tournament.
972, or 47.5%, ran Force
140, or 6.8%, ran Duress or Thoughtseize without the other two.
121, or 5.9%, ran Tendrils of Agony.

Total: 60.2%

Over the past 30 days:

197 decks placed at a Legacy tournament
94, or 47.7% ran Force
9, or 4.6%, ran Duress or Thoughtseize to the exclusion of the other two.
13, or 6.6%, ran Tendrils.

Total: 58.9%

So the story here is that over time, Force of Will has been creeping steadily upwards from a 40% to a 50% controlling share. Discard strategies have waned in the face of this slowly evolving metagame. The share of the metagame devoted to the two nominally strong anti-Tendrils strategies of discard and counters, and Tendrils itself, has actually stabilized or declined:

2005-2006: 56.2%
2007-2008: 60.5%
2009: 60.5%
2010: 60.2%
Past month: 58.9%

But dropping discard as a failed strategy, the actual growth in combined shares of Force and Tendrils looks quite different:

2005-2006: 41.3%
2007-2008: 46.6%
2009: 49.6%
2010: 53.4%
Past month: 54.3%

So, I have to revise my previous opinion as wrong. Black is not in fact a viable strategy by itself. We in fact have a format that is increasingly and steadily controlled by blue, with increasingly strong Tendrils strategies helping to squeeze out every other archetype (most of which themselves involved blue).

Looking at the format exclusively in terms of decks using blue cards*, we get more information of the rising waters of Legacy:

In 2005-2006, 46.8% of the placing decks ran blue.
In 2007-2008, that number was 53.2%
By 2009 it was 54.2%.
By 2010 it was 58.9%, and over the past month, despite the banning of Mystical Tutor and the nominal weakening of blue-reliant combo, the number remains at 58.4%, almost a super-majority.

I submit that it's probably statistically wrong not to play blue or anti-blue at this point, and the best anti-blue strategies tend to be blue themselves. If blue is simply unhealthily dominant in Legacy- and I think that's increasingly the picture- then either Force/Brainstorm or Tendrils is probably the main culprit. I would prefer to try out the idea that it's Tendrils, as I think the loss of Brainstorm/Force would do more damage to the format's enjoyability and diversity.


*I ran through the deck check archives for all decks running either one of the blue duals, Island, or Brainstorm. This missed a few Affownity lists, roughly 100 Affinity lists running Thoughtcast and probably a few Tendrils lists running Meditates or the like, but I don't think it's unfair to disinclude those.

eta:

It occurs to me that we also haven't taken into account the "scrub" factor in small tournaments. So I went back through the numbers checking for the percentage of placing decks running Brainstorm d/or Force of Will in all tournaments with 100+ people. Edited in are the corrected numbers for the overall field, using Brainstorm d/or Force of Will alone.

2005-2006:
Overall:
216 out of 491: 44% blue.
>100 man:
21 out of 50 decks: 42% blue.

2007-2008:
Overall:
1,623 out of 3,387: 47.9% blue
>100 man:
57 out of 104 decks: 54.8% blue.

2009:
Overall:
1,582 out of 3,153: 50.2% blue
>100 man:
81 out of 138 decks: 58.7% blue.

2010
Overall:
1,112 out of 2,046: 54.3% blue
>100 man:
79 out of 122 decks: 64.8% blue.

The past 30 days:
Overall:
108 out of 197: 54.8% blue
>100 man
16 out of 24 decks: 66.7% blue.

I am going to revise my statements from before again. I said that we are nearing a point where one either plays a Tendrils strategy, a Force strategy, or a discard strategy.

I was wrong. We are at the point where blue has super-dominance of the format by a 2:1 ratio, and discard is largely only viable as a complement.

To repeat: blue decks have a 2:1 advantage over non-blue decks in large tournaments. The format is officially flooded, and we do in fact have empirical proof of this. Some action must be taken to rebalance the format. If it's not a banning of Brainstorm or Force, the next most effective attempt to square the colors would be banning Tendrils.


eta pt II:

It's still not clear how many players were at the Starcity Open in Denver. It had 7 rounds, which means 65-128 players. If we include the top 8, then 21 out of the 32 placing lists of the past 30 days will have played blue, for a marginally less stupid 65.6% dominance. If we add the top 16, then 25 of the 40 placing lists, or 62.5% will have played either Force or Brainstorm (with 1 deck, Lands, running blue for Intuition, but neither Bstorm nor Force). Scanning back over the year 2010, 93 lists running some amount of blue duals or Islands but neither Bstorm nor Force placed, with 4 of those from >100 man tournaments. I'm not sure how those fit into the calculations but I don't think it's too relevant. They can probably be discounted for the larger purpose of the discussion.

[Gheizen64]

The other colors are handicapped in eternal...that's kinda the whole point.

Hm, I think we either need to ban Underground Sea or Saito...one of those is definately too powerful.

You're right having auto-losses is unacceptable...so in legacy you have to run blue or black because of this. You can also run zoo though since so many people run it, it's likely someone does well with it, :smile:.

No one is dodging that point...I addressed it earlier. And as Goblin and I have said force of will and thoutseize are still the only catch all answers...if tendrils is banned you're still going to need thoughtseize or force for all of the other non-permanent problem spells that rgw can't deal with in any one card.

Difference is that knowing what the best combo deck in the format is would give you some rooms for your deck design other than splashing 20+ blue cards. If said deck isn't storm tendril, obviously.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

Another objection people might raise is that without knowing the overall field, we can't know how disproportionately good blue actually is in this metagame. To answer this I've gone back over the data examining the total number of decks that won each tournament in a given period, with how many of those ran Force of Will d/or Brainstorm. It's almost not statistically relevant but I've included the >100 man tournament winners separately just for fun.

2005-2006:

Total winning decks: 77
Winning decks with blue: 37, or 48% (overperforms)
>100 man winning decks: 5
>100 man winning decks with blue: 4, or 80% (overperforms)

2007-2008:

Total winning decks: 471
Winning decks with blue: 240, or 51% (overperforms)
>100 man winning decks: 10
>100 man winning decks with blue: 5, or 50% (underperforms)

2009:

Total winning decks: 456
Winning decks with blue: 233, or 51.1% (overperforms)
>100 man winning decks: 17
>100 man winning decks with blue: 11, or 64.7 (overperforms)

2010:

Total winning decks: 289
Total winning decks with blue: 171, or 59.2% (overperforms)
>100 man winning decks: 13
>100 man winning decks with blue: 11, or 84.6 (overperforms)

Past 30 days:
Total winning decks: 29
Total winning decks with blue: 16, or 55.2% (overperforms)
>100 man winning decks: 3
>100 man winning decks with blue: 3, or 100% (overperforms)


eta: Fixed the numbers to apply the same definition of blue across the board. Confirming that blue is in fact simply (and increasingly) ridiculous.

[Piceli89]

Does anyone actually believe this?

No? Then I won't spend too much time addressing it.

If a deck runs nothing but Force and a 20-turn clock they might have problems with Tendrils. Certainly, the strength of Tendrils decks is that they can fight through even disruption decks. But to argue that Goblins is more likely to beat Tendrils than any given heavily-played FoW-based deck is deceit or ignorance. Based on the sudden tactic of Tendrils-supporters to claim that actually, discard and counters aren't very good against combo, I'm going to go with deceit. The problem is that to swallow this argument you have to have severe brain damage.



(Premise: to me the good Storm Combo left are TES and DDFT. I don't consider the others because I like well-structured configurations with cheap manipulation and protection. I'm refering to those, since I dislike glass cannons like SI and Belcher.)

It's really astonishing how you are manipulating the posts cutting single speechs to promote your arguments. I was not saying that Goblins is more likely to beat any Fow-based deck, I was just underlining the fact that Fow alone, but maybe not even Force plus Daze if not accompanied by a relevant clock, can't beat Tendrils, contrarily to what is believed here. Do you want to have an example? Take Canadian Threshold. That's full of disruption, a canonic list contains:

4 Spell Snare
4 Fow
4 Daze
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
4 Stifle
4 Wasteland

So, obviously, since it packs so much harmful cards, it should be a Storm Combo hoser. Guess what? It is not. Ask the majority of experienced storm combo player, and they will tell you that Canadian Threshold can be doable to even favorable because they apply small pressure to your life in the form of Mongoose, and when they play Goyf they're likely to tap out some mana,and that's when you Chant them. You're allowed to slowroll them and develop your hand. You can also keep sketchy hands with lots of lands and little business and take quite all the time you want to build, unless they go very aggro (which is unlikely to happen from them).

Now, take Goblins. Such slow hands wouldn't help against a fast start with turn 1 Lackey. Sometimes they go the nuts and just roll you over in 4 turns. Now, I tell you a secret: people who has never played ritual-based combo flawly assumes that it's able to consistently go off on turn 2 or 3, always. You should know that even Storm Combo can open bad hands, fail in digging the needed cards with cantrips, and sometimes lose to a single Wasteland taking off the right colour if they're crushing you with creatures very quickly? We're not all Bryant Cook who opens the magic hand against the needed deck, and sometimes we can even fizzle, especially via Ad Nauseam.

Finally, discard is good against Tendrils decks to a certain point. Again, anyone with experience will confirm. Solid Storm Combo usually manages to beat those decks in the end, and the key is maximizing the efficiency of cantrips in order to sandbag the right cards at the right time. I guess decks like Belcher do suffer a lot Duress effects because they're forced to topdeck a business spell and they have 11 out of 60 in there (4 Belcher, 3 EtW, 4 Wish). TES is better because it runs Ponder and Brainstorm, but sometimes a well timed Wasteland and some Duress slow it down a lot. DDFT is actually the one which is better set, because your goal is to resolve an early Sensei's Divining Top, and things are going to be favourable for you after that. Top is the main cause those decks don't really perform very well in the current metagame. I've played against Eva Green or MonoBlack a lot in testing, faced them in tournaments, and I've lost 2 games out of 12. Everytime Top was on the table I won, even despites multiple Seizes, double Hymns and Wasteland.

I'm not trying to proclaim ala Nazi propaganda ala "Storm Combo is unbeatable!", I'm just saying that it can also be built to stand very well the blue and black disruption. The point is that,although being very strong, it won't be a major threat for the format because, unless they print another excessively broken card of easy use like Ad Nauseam, now we're left with slower or more fragile builds, and it actually takes more luck and practice to get on the top tables with those. Sometimes we even lose to aggro decks with fast starts and little disruption. This detracts most of the people to take up this archetype, especially the ignorants who think "urgh mystical is banned so combo is dead".
If Tendrils would become a real danger again (assuming it ever was), be sure Wizards will act. As of now, it just won't happen.

So, before saying you have to be brain damaged to swallow my arguments, please experience more with ritual-Tendrils based decks, not by your refined words and Deckcheck data, but by facts. For what it's worth, however, this thread is just endless speculation - clever people keep going straight on and, instead of losing 2 hours talking about a thing that won't happen, they spend time innovating the format or, as you should do, testing decks extensively to talk with a basis of experience.


.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

So, before saying you have to be brain damaged to swallow my arguments, please experience more with ritual-Tendrils based decks, not by your refined words and Deckcheck data, but by facts.

You clearly do not know what this word means.

Anecdotal evidence that something is true doesn't trump statistical data. Just because your friend Frank is gay doesn't mean most Franks are gay.

I am not interested in unsourced opinions. Back up your claims. "Go play the deck" is no longer an acceptable argument in this thread.

[Piceli89]

You clearly do not know what this word means.

Anecdotal evidence that something is true doesn't trump statistical data. Just because your friend Frank is gay doesn't mean most Franks are gay.

I am not interested in unsourced opinions. Back up your claims. "Go play the deck" is no longer an acceptable argument in this thread.

Ok, go on fighting your personal Tendrils war with your data without even knowing a Tendrils deck works and acts. That's perfectly acceptable, instead. Also, go on counteracting anyone's argument ad libitum, even if 20 people are trying to show you that something may be wrong in your assumptions - that's the key of having success. Is it really a costructive behaviour?
Good luck.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

Ok, go on fighting your personal Tendrils war with your data without even knowing a Tendrils deck works and acts. That's perfectly acceptable, instead. Also, go on counteracting anyone's argument ad libitum, even if 20 people are trying to show you that something may be wrong in your assumptions - that's the key of having success. Is it really a costructive behaviour?
Good luck.

God, I know, what a dick. Anyone can prove things true with facts and logic! It takes a real man to argue from the gut about what his feelings tell him is true. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BSE_saVX_2A)

[Artowis]

Rather than wade deeply into this, I just wanted to point something out.

re: FOW

Even though it helps the combo matchup, it also helps all matchups.

You keep saying this over and over again and it really isn't true. FOW is outright bad in the Zoo and Merfolk matches and not all that powerful in the Control mirror either. Multiple pro players have sideboard plans that trade the Forces out in various matches. If the combo decks weren't so outright scary, Force would be a debated slot in Control decks instead of the auto-include that it is. This isn't Vintage where every deck is doing something so outright scary and broken in the early turns you need the help, over half the commonly played decks in the format play on some level close to fair.

Force of Will is amazing in the unfair decks and good in decks trying to combat them. It's soooo annoying seeing everyone run around chattering about how god-like the card is when it was almost always used in formats with a dominant combo deck using (what else) Force of Will as it's main protection!

Oh and everyone please stop comparing things to Standard if you didn't play in those formats, especially the terrible banning analysis from them, thanks bunches.

[Valtrix]

Statistics about blue decks

These statistics are rather useless without a comparison to all of the other colors. Decks are rarely only one color, and it's very possible that some of the other colors have a comparable share of placement in these decks that are "dominated" by blue. Looking at these percentages without comparison to all of the other colors is not that enlightening.

[DrJones]

These statistics are rather useless without a comparison to all of the other colors. Decks are rarely only one color, and it's very possible that some of the other colors have a comparable share of placement in these decks that are "dominated" by blue. Looking at these percentages without comparison to all of the other colors is not that enlightening.100% of placements in large tournaments this month is hardly useless. Anyways, he is using "blue decks" vs "non-blue decks" which are mutually exclusive sets, as he wants to see if you really are required to play blue to win tournaments, so he uses the correct statistics and what you are doing is purposely avoiding the question.

[Valtrix]

Anyways, he is using "blue decks" vs "non-blue decks" which are mutually exclusive sets, as he wants to see if you really are required to play blue to win tournaments, so he uses the correct statistics and what you are doing is purposely avoiding the question.

So, you're right. "Blue decks" vs. "non-blue decks" are mutally exclusive sets, but that still ignores all of the other colors. Blue decks and green decks are not mutually exclusive sets. If we do the same breakdown for all of the other colors, as in "Green decks" vs. "Non-green decks," then we can begin to see if colors are disproportionate. Decks are almost always multicolored, so using a narrow statistic like "blue" and "non-blue" by itself is worthless. Until you want to compare those numbers for blue vs. non-blue to the numbers of any color vs. non-that color, you really have no good picture of how much all the colors are being played. So no, I'm not avoiding any questions here.

[Cthuloo]

So, you're right. "Blue decks" vs. "non-blue decks" are mutally exclusive sets, but that still ignores all of the other colors. Blue decks and green decks are not mutually exclusive sets. If we do the same breakdown for all of the other colors, as in "Green decks" vs. "Non-green decks," then we can begin to see if colors are disproportionate. Decks are almost always multicolored, so using a narrow statistic like "blue" and "non-blue" by itself is worthless. Until you want to compare those numbers for blue vs. non-blue to the numbers of any color vs. non-that color, you really have no good picture of how much all the colors are being played. So no, I'm not avoiding any questions here.


This is definitely a reasonable point, still more analysis is required to make unquestionable claims, but IBA's datas are still worth considering. I'm not sure about the conclusion, though. IBA claims that the omnipresence of force decks is due to Tendrills of Agony warping the metagame, but his statistics show that blue decks were above 40% of the top 8s when Storm was still less than 3% of the same top 8s (and at this point I find hard to believe that a handful of not fully developed decks could dictate the metagame). As a side note, as a faithfull black player, I can state that discard is very marginally useful against combo. Like FoW, can slow down the combo player (but less effectively than Fow, since it's you that are spendind mana to get rid of their threat, instead of them wasting mana into a force), and to be effective it should be repeated and backed by a fast clock. So, ritual->duress+tourach, ritual-> stalker may steal games, but it definitely isn't something you can count on.

Back on topic, what scares me a bit is not the strength of a single category of combo decks, but the multitude that has been spreading lately. One can effectively hate out TES, playing a non blue deck. But can one effectively hate out TES, DDANT, Shelldock Emrakul, Aeon Bridge, Show and Tell Emrakul / Sneak Attack, Hypergenesis, Dream Halls, Reanimator, Aluren, Iona-Retainers, Belcher, Spanish Inquisition and many more I'm probably forgetting? This is something to think about a bit, and brings up the issue why Force has been, is and will always be popular: it gives you at least a fighting chance against whatever you may meet. Nowadays the issue could become quite important.

[DrJones]

Well, it's true it's hard to defend against every combo, but most combo decks have their own share of bad nonblue matchups. There are combo decks that lose to zoo, others that lose to enchantress, other that lose to trinisphere stompy, death n taxes, etc. (some of them aren't like that, but those deserve to be nerfed). I think that's "fair". What it's bad is having a deck that owns everything with few answers against it, and I think it's as bad if that deck is a variation of the blue shell than if it's a combo deck, because everything ends in having only one reasonable deck choice to bring to a tournament.

Note also that precisely because FoW is there, WotC doesn't feel the need to address the "too many combo decks" problem and so their aglomeration becomes too much for nonblue decks to handle. Look at my sig and see if it makes sense to you now. This situation is provoked because FoW is there. FoW is not needed to protect against broken combo, but broken combo is allowed to exist because of FoW. Moreover, reading R&D articles gives the impression that decks like ANT are in the format for the sole purpose of giving a strong contender to FoW decks. It's probable that the banning of MT actually made blue decks even better by giving players less reasons not to play them.

[swoop]

Please look at the other topic and stop these pointless discussions over FoW/ToA/Lackey.

Not one deck dominates the format. Every deck is beatable. Today some colours are better, some are worse.
Over next few months we will see what WOTC decides, but I honestly hope they decide to do nothing.

And I heard today that InfamousBearAssassin can not be wrong, no matter how much he gets beaten around by Mon's arguments

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

Please look at the other topic and stop these pointless discussions over FoW/ToA/Lackey.

Not one deck dominates the format. Every deck is beatable. Today some colours are better, some are worse.
Over next few months we will see what WOTC decides, but I honestly hope they decide to do nothing.

And I heard today that InfamousBearAssassin can not be wrong, no matter how much he gets beaten around by Mon's arguments

Why do you even post if you don't have anything to contribute? Is this like an ego thing, where you just have to hear your own voice, no matter what inanities you're spouting?

@Valtrix: I'll get the correlating color data for you, but I'm going to have to switch back to using lands as a filter. Hold on.

[ummon]

Well, it's true it's hard to defend against every combo, but most combo decks have their own share of bad nonblue matchups. There are combo decks that lose to zoo, others that lose to enchantress, other that lose to trinisphere stompy, death n taxes, etc. (some of them aren't like that, but those deserve to be nerfed). I think that's "fair". What it's bad is having a deck that owns everything with few answers against it, and I think it's as bad if that deck is a variation of the blue shell than if it's a combo deck, because everything ends in having only one reasonable deck choice to bring to a tournament.

Note also that precisely because FoW is there, WotC doesn't feel the need to address the "too many combo decks" problem and so their aglomeration becomes too much for nonblue decks to handle. Look at my sig and see if it makes sense to you now. This situation is provoked because FoW is there. FoW is not needed to protect against broken combo, but broken combo is allowed to exist because of FoW. Moreover, reading R&D articles gives the impression that decks like ANT are in the format for the sole purpose of giving a strong contender to FoW decks. It's probable that the banning of MT actually made blue decks even better by giving players less reasons not to play them.

I just noticed your sig. So true.

[swoop]

Why do you even post if you don't have anything to contribute? Is this like an ego thing, where you just have to hear your own voice, no matter what inanities you're spouting?

@Valtrix: I'll get the correlating color data for you, but I'm going to have to switch back to using lands as a filter. Hold on.

Why do you post numbers? This is not poker where math is the most important factor in determining of the outcome.

Human factors and decks here on are a much more bigger issue.

Last week problem was too many control decks, this week its combo, and a year ago the problem was zoo?

[TheMightyQuinn]

@Everyone who is saying that FoW and discard aren't that strong versus combo:

Are you arguing for the banning of Tendrils? If you are, you're doing a great job. If you're not, get a new argument.

[Benjammn]

This is definitely a reasonable point, still more analysis is required to make unqueJstionable claims, but IBA's datas are still worth considering. I'm not sure about the conclusion, though. IBA claims that the omnipresence of force decks is due to Tendrills of Agony warping the metagame, but his statistics show that blue decks were above 40% of the top 8s when Storm was still less than 3% of the same top 8s (and at this point I find hard to believe that a handful of not fully developed decks could dictate the metagame). As a side note, as a faithfull black player, I can state that discard is very marginally useful against combo. Like FoW, can slow down the combo player (but less effectively than Fow, since it's you that are spendind mana to get rid of their threat, instead of them wasting mana into a force), and to be effective it should be repeated and backed by a fast clock. So, ritual->duress+tourach, ritual-> stalker may steal games, but it definitely isn't something you can count on.

OK, so it wasn't just me that read IBA as saying this. For all the numbers you spew, do you realize that banning Tendrils will not make the amount of Force of Wills played go down at all? People play Force because it is versatile. People don't play it because it specifically stops Tendrils/combo. Making this connection is absolutely idiotic.

[Gheizen64]

OK, so it wasn't just me that read IBA as saying this. For all the numbers you spew, do you realize that banning Tendrils will not make the amount of Force of Wills played go down at all? People play Force because it is versatile. People don't play it because it specifically stops Tendrils/combo. Making this connection is absolutely idiotic.

I believe having one of the pillar of the meta answered only by heavy blue decks is a pretty strong reason for FoW numbers to be so high. If people played anything but Zoo, FoW probably wouldn't even be played. FoW is a card that is quite often sided out against Zoo.
But that isn't the only point. The point is that if you want to win a tournament you can't accept having a 10% of the field as a 10/90 matchup. While in smaller events this may not be a crucial point, it become so as you enter an important tournament.

[kinda]

I think at this point we've established that force of will is warping the format far worse then tendrils of agony...now we should establish why can't ban force of will and nothing will change, :D.

T1 Broken Plays (on the play) that Require Force of Will specifically as an answer.

ancient tomb/mox diamond->trinisphere
ancient tomb/mox diamond->chalice of the void
land grant, rit, rit, accel, whatever->empty the warrens/goblin charbelcher
ancient tomb/lotus petal/Snt->Hive Mind, Progenitus, Emrakul, Form of the Dragon, Dream Halls
something, something, darkside->Ad Nauseam (Ad Nauseam is played in extended btw despite no tendrils there)
land, dark ritual, lotus petal, lotus petal, cabal ritual, doomsday, cantrip->T1 emrakul with extra turn.
Spanish Inquisition Voodoo
land/mana bond or exploration->complete board control

And those are just the ones off the top of my head that exist in a format where 50% of people are playing force of will...

[4eak]

I've read this thread, and while I'm perfectly willing to go line by line, quote and rebut, I think it might just be more effective to say my piece and leave it at that. Here goes:


It is easy to confuse "influence" with "presence" regarding metagaming. Compared to many blue-based control strategies, Storm is only somewhat visible in terms of the number of pilots and number of wins it has in the format, but that does not necessitate a low level of influence. Many of you have missed a very relevant ingredient to the debate: Storm has a low presence, but an immense degree of influence.


Storm is the gatekeeper of Legacy.

Storm has amazingly high percentage matchups against large sections of the format. This is a unique aspect of the deck, as few decks can honestly boast a +90% chance to win against a single (let alone multitudes of) decks in Legacy. This effect is especially pronounced against (what are now considered) Tier 2 and below decks. Tier 2 decks and below are largely there because Storm decks force them out of viability. Storm is the complete foil to a ton of would-be archetypes, and it is certainly a much larger part of the baseline test of adequacy for Legacy than many people realize.

Additionally, (I said this in the previous IBA-based Tendrils thread) Storm, to some extent, runs metagame-defense maneuvers for blue-based control decks. Storm preys upon many decks that would have some advantage over blue-based control decks.

Storm's influence is indirect, but quite relevant.


The Legacy Triangle is Blue-based control, Storm, and Anti-blue.

That is the mile-high view of the metagame, and I'll readily admit there are exceptions and cornercases which don't fit neatly into the paradigm. For example, a bunch of the top-end Anti-blue decks actually play blue themselves.

We should note that Storm is not a glass-canon. In fact, it is exceedingly hard to build decks which act as a complete foil to Storm (I'll say the same for other decks as well). There are some decks that can break even or even have the advantage against Storm, namely blue-based control (aggro-control usually). The dominance of blue-control shells limits Storm's viability and visibility in the format, but again, that does not necessarily mean that Storm lack's influence.

Again, you should see that the very archetypes for which Storm plays defense in the metagame are also the archetypes that keep Storm at bay. So, while Blue-based (aggro-)control poses a serious barrier to storm's presence in the metagame; Simultaneously, the mere possibility of Storm's presence poses a serious barrier to blue-based (aggro-)control predators.

For the ban-talks -- This is a strategic discussion, not necessarily a normative one either*. For someone who might be tired of blue-based control (IBA, you might be...), a ban on Storm would enable innovation against blue-based control. Also, and this is nothing new, a series of bans which would seriously diminimish blue-based control (FoW/Brainstorm/CB/Goyf, for example), would let Storm archetypes out their cages to destroy the format, and thus also require banning at least some forms of Storm (EtW/Tendrils/LED, for example).


A large demographic of MTG players fear and hate strong combo (WotC included). (Yes, call me crazy; let me get my tin foil hat.)

Storm's use of the stack (lack of permanents), resilience, consistency, speed, and overall feeling that you aren't playing "normal magic" all contribute it to being the "easy to loathe" deck of the format. That not only influences discussions on the topic and perceptions of the format, but it directly limits the pool of players even willing to play the archetype.

Combo doesn't see nearly as much play as it reasonably should. Some pseudo-economists may want to suggest that "the best" deck is what everyone is actually trying to play in magic. I disagree; normatively, everyone "should", yes, but they don't. I know tons of people who won't play styles/archetypes, even when these decks are clearly the best, simply because they don't enjoy it. Storm can have that black-and-white effect on would-be pilots. I also think the pool of Combo-pilots tends to cannabilize itself among the combo archetypes, and remains smaller than it should be if we are all playing to win (I think there are sub-games and different goals among the magic community, even the competitive scene). Because people can so greatly dislike the combo archetypes, there are fewer Storm pilots than there should be.


Storm is excessively difficult to play correctly which allows many to misinterpret the power of the deck

Storm has the highest pilot-skill caps in the format. This doesn't mean that less-skilled pilots can't win with the deck, but rather the point at which Storm's pilot-skill returns no more benefit (win percentage) is the highest of any decks in the format. Assuming the usual bell-curve for the demographic of player skill, we need to realize that few players actually ever see Storm played (even close to) correctly. This makes it especially difficult to understand the possible strength of the deck.

Discussions of the power level of Storm have so much range ("it is so broken" to "My U/W Tempo deck pwns storm") partly because the deck has the largest range of power level due to its skill curve and cap as well as the fewest number of pilots that can play it maximally well.


Post-Mystical Tutor's ban, Storm has an increased skill-requirement to viability which acts as a barrier to its presence.

With the ban of MT, the deck doesn't win in "easy-mode" nearly as often. To get the same results as pre-MT-ban, pilots need to be much more skilled. As I predicted in the MT-Ban thread, we may see an even lower presence of Storm due to an increase in skill-requirement, but we also see that the deck is still just as functional at the highest-skill levels of play.

At least for the short term, Storm loses more presence and some (but not the same degree of) influence. This is part of the reason we've seen a resurgence in blue-based (pseudo-)dedicated control decks.

Storm is still a contender, still influential, and even with low presence, it has high impact. Again, please remember that there is a lot more to influencing metagames than top 8 percentages.

Lastly, and only partially related, I think the continued development of blue-based control/combo decks merits further analysis.




peace,
4eak

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

I'm open to alternate interpretations of data, and I'm open to different criteria or arguments for bannings. However, my patience for witless ponces that have neither arguments nor data but want their feelings to count for something despite evidence to the contrary is at an end, and if you think you fit in this category, kindly piss off.


I think at this point we've established that force of will is warping the format far worse then tendrils of agony...now we should establish why can't ban force of will and nothing will change, :D.

T1 Broken Plays (on the play) that Require Force of Will specifically as an answer.

ancient tomb/mox diamond->trinisphere
ancient tomb/mox diamond->chalice of the void
land grant, rit, rit, accel, whatever->empty the warrens/goblin charbelcher
ancient tomb/lotus petal/Snt->Hive Mind, Progenitus, Emrakul, Form of the Dragon, Dream Halls
something, something, darkside->Ad Nauseam (Ad Nauseam is played in extended btw despite no tendrils there)
land, dark ritual, lotus petal, lotus petal, cabal ritual, doomsday, cantrip->T1 emrakul with extra turn.
Spanish Inquisition Voodoo
land/mana bond or exploration->complete board control

And those are just the ones off the top of my head that exist in a format where 50% of people are playing force of will...

Turn 1 Trinisphere is annoying but doesn't necessarily end the game. Ditto to EtW, even Progenitus and Emrakul, certainly Form of the Dragon. And the more a deck relies on comboing out early the weaker it is. Powerful combo decks can go off late game, more or less when they need to.

[ummon]

So, IBA has quite clearly shown that Force of Will is a defining card in legacy. Now why is this? Unfortunately, there isn't enough controlled data to experimentally find the reason that Force is so common. However, because Force gives card disadvantage, it can be theorized that the only reason people play cards is to counter early must-answer cards. This means that the prevalence of Force is evidence that there are too many must answer cards in legacy. Thus, to balance out the color wheel and lower the rock-paper-scissors style matchups that don't adequately reward player skill, one must ban the powerful of those must-answer cards, or give other colors access to something as powerful as Force of Will.

Personally, I think Dr. Jones's suggestion is best. Ban Force of Will. That will force you (no pun intended) to ban the OP cards.

[kinda]

Turn 1 Trinisphere is annoying but doesn't necessarily end the game. Ditto to EtW, even Progenitus and Emrakul, certainly Form of the Dragon. And the more a deck relies on comboing out early the weaker it is. Powerful combo decks can go off late game, more or less when they need to.

T1 Trinisphere usually wins the game...when coupled with a threat, wasteland, or smokestack it does...you know this.

12 goblin tokens turn 1? I hope you have enginnered explosives in your hand.

Pprogenitus, ermakul, and form of the dragon turn 1? I guess you're running nevinryll's disk now...or making sure you have diabolic edict and krosan grip in your opener. The card's called show and tell not ***** here comes Emrakul...you can either be prepared for shroud creatures and enchantments...or run force of will.

You ignore Ad Nauseam into non tendrils win, doomsday, and Goblin Charbelcher since nothing short of foil stops those. I'm sure there are others...

Many combo decks like show and tell do run protection and don't have to go off turn 1...but if there is no force of will nothing is going to stop them from going off turn 1 unprotected every time they're on the play.

Edit: Goblin Chief gave a much more extensive list of problems earlier that clearly show that the format needs force.

[TheMightyQuinn]

Personally, I think Dr. Jones's suggestion is best. Ban Force of Will. That will force you (no pun intended) to ban the OP cards.

Banning a card so you have to ban other cards makes no sense. At all.

If you ban the "OP cards" outright, people will stop playing FoW anyway since, according to you, it is only played to combat the "OP cards". Right?

[ummon]

Banning a card so you have to ban other cards makes no sense. At all.

If you ban the "OP cards" outright, people will stop playing FoW anyway since, according to you, it is only played to combat the "OP cards". Right?

That would work, but it would be easier to identify the OP cards in a post Force environment.

[TheMightyQuinn]

The "post Force environment" would be out of control though. So much so that I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of people quit Legacy. Its pretty easy to tell what would be broken if FoW wasn't around anyway.

[Gheizen64]

Banning a card so you have to ban other cards makes no sense. At all.

If you ban the "OP cards" outright, people will stop playing FoW anyway since, according to you, it is only played to combat the "OP cards". Right?

I don't understand why people act so irritated in a similar discussion and have to dumbfold the arguments of the other because they want to prove theirs. No one said that with tendril gone, Fow would go too.
I am perfectly fine with non banning tendril or anything in storm right now. I'm saying this honestly, as long as Columbus remain a somewhat isolated case. Columbus made me rethink what i thought about this format. And showed what i believe is a trend, a format moving more and more toward blue. But it could very well be that Scars release a mox for artifacts and then prison aggro decks will arise and we'll see a completely new meta and completely new top eights. Who know.
But if in some months the format is blue/anti-blue that's also blue and storm, well, it will be bad.

[kinda]

The core of most blue decks (except merfolk) is brainstorm and force of will. Anyone who's played with those cards knows how well they work together. We've already established that you can't ban force of will or their will be problems. So that leaves us with banning brainstorm. If brainstorm is banned consistency of blue decks (and tendrils) goes down and thus their power level, without opening up the format to the aforementioned problems. Blue decks with force will still be around but won't put up the 50% plus numbers they currently are and in turn the blue deck without brainstorm (merfolk...which is a meta deck designed to beat blue) will have its numbers decreased as well. The only problem I see to this solution is that I and many others enjoy playing brainstorm...but that's because it's so good.

[troopatroop]

[long here quote] - Bardo

+1 This guy knows what he's talking about.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

-Color-penetration-in-Legacy]Numbers are up (http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?18629-[Big-Pile-of-Numbers) for color penetration overall.

I don't accept the argument that Force of Will is too big to fail, by the way. If in fact other decks become broken if Force were banned, that still wouldn't be a good argument for keeping a card around that is broken. But I don't think that likely for the same reason I don't think Force needs to be banned; most combos are answerable with plenty of other heavily played or quite maindeckable cards. Tendrils is unique in that there's very little maindeckable outside of blue that really works well against it, mainly Gaddock Teeg or a shitton of discard.

eta: Stupid url tags.

[Tammit67]

Look at the banned list. Everything there is there because:

1) Ante, lol
2) Dexterity, lol
3) Artifact mana
4) Threats (typically combo) that win the game near on the spot should they resolve/activate once.

Not one of them is an 'answer' deemed too efficient. FoW has real consequences that loses games all the time. But how often do you here "Yeah, I lost because I had to pitch X to FoW to not let Y resolve"? It has the ability to, and its presence is a necessity to, stop turn 1/2 plays that severely limit the interactivity between decks. Against decks that go all in on a spell resolving, it is a roadblock for sure. Against decks with higher threat density, it is almost a good thing when they must force, since your threats are more easily replaced, and your opponent has fewer cards that you have to worry about.

Tendrils decks are stopped/held in check by decks with either a huge disruption suite, the most prevalent of which is force/daze until CBtop comes online coupled with a clock, or decks that attempt non interactivity (staxx, d stompy...) Since both of these strategies are not exclusively good against tendrils/storm ie: not mainboard hate, what is the problem?

"Tendrils beats tier 3 deck XYZ"- Every format you have something to that extent. The top decks are meta'd against each other, while a few of them act as a barrier to 'lesser' strategies. Just because this wall is called combo, or zoo (which does in fact keep several things out, very few things can consistently beat both), is irrelevant. No matter what you ban, some decks just will not be able to hold their ground in a gauntlet that emerges.

[DrJones]

Look at the banned list. Everything there is there because:

1) Ante, lol
2) Dexterity, lol
3) Artifact mana
4) Threats (typically combo) that win the game near on the spot should they resolve/activate once.

Not one of them is an 'answer' deemed too efficient.Please explain then:
Balance, Oath of Druids, Time Walk, Land Tax, Timetwister, Black Vise, Demonic Tutor, Gush, Library of Alexandria, Mana Drain, Skullclamp and Strip mine.

I'll explain it to you. They are there because they are either "grossly undercosted for their effect", "too efficient at what they do", or "have a negative impact in the metagame". Timewarp, Timetwister, and Counterspell are appropiately costed and legacy legal.


No matter what you ban, some decks just will not be able to hold their ground in a gauntlet that emerges.Explain then why they bother in banning cards.

[Tammit67]

Please explain then:
Balance threat, float mana goyf?, Oath of Druids Seriously? you are going to argue Oath isn't a threat?, Time Walk again?, Land Tax, Timetwister, Black Vise, Demonic Tutor redundancy for threats is nice, Gush, Library of Alexandria, Mana Drain bait force, counter, play something?, Skullclamp A huge card advantage engine and Strip mine ends the game with recursion.

I'll explain it to you. They are there because they are either "grossly undercosted for their effect", "too efficient at what they do", or "have a negative impact in the metagame". Timewarp, Timetwister, and Counterspell are appropiately costed and legacy legal.

Your condescending tone is... unwarranted.

Are they not all threats? Albeit very efficient at what they do? Every last one of them sets up a play or line of play that ends the game. Force does not currently do that. Not without a compact combo, most of which are banned.

"Grossly undercosted/too efficent" are not as strong as arguments as "negative impact". This is the metagame. If it was blue centric, or red centric does it matter? Are there not many decks available, and decently viable, to legacy because, in part, Force's role to encourage interactivity?

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

Mind Twist
Balance
Mana Drain
Strip Mine

Your argument is wrong on the facts.

[Tammit67]

Mind Twist
Balance
Mana Drain
Strip Mine

Your argument is wrong on the facts.

I'm listening, go on... If i am wrong on a few exceptions, are they relevant to Force needing a ban?

And they ban cards for overpowered interactions or non interactivity with the opponent. To say Force does this is silly.

[majikal]

Timewarp, Timetwister, and Counterspell are appropiately costed and legacy legal.

If it is then I've been playing the wrong deck for years!

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

I'm listening, go on... If i am wrong on a few exceptions, are they relevant to Force needing a ban?

And they ban cards for overpowered interactions or non interactivity with the opponent. To say Force does this is silly.

Your argument wasn't relevant to the question to start with. The question is whether or not Force of Will or any other card is warping the metagame, and whether or not this requires action. The answer to the first question is clearly yes. The answer to the second question varies, as does suggestions for what action ought to be taken. But to simply say that no card has ever been banned for being a good answer, and then to waffle and try and shift the goalposts when this is proven incorrect, isn't helpful in any sense.

[Tammit67]

Your argument wasn't relevant to the question to start with. The question is whether or not Force of Will or any other card is warping the metagame, and whether or not this requires action. The answer to the first question is clearly yes. The answer to the second question varies, as does suggestions for what action ought to be taken. But to simply say that no card has ever been banned for being a good answer, and then to waffle and try and shift the goalposts when this is proven incorrect, isn't helpful in any sense.

My argument is that Force warps the meta in the way the presence of merfolk or zoo does: Powerful yes, but not in need of action. I also tried (and apparently failed) to state that the current banned list does not include answers, and is mostly comprised of threats. (which I'll explain below I guess)

Mind twist may or may not be warranted (which is another discussion entirely). Balance allows you to set up a turn to break the symmetry and resolve a threat on a nearly empty board. Strip mine threatens your entire mana base, despite your attempts to play around wasteland, and is a huge threat when paired with recursion. And Mana drain enables a turn for the control player to essentially use his opponents mana to resolve his own spells. It is not typically used as the default answer, but a way to play high cost spells.

Force does not set up such plays and is used for protection at a steep prices that only pays off in certain circumstances that few current decks can realistically set up. That's all.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

My argument is that Force warps the meta in the way the presence of merfolk or zoo does: Powerful yes, but not in need of action. I also tried (and apparently failed) to state that the current banned list does not include answers, and is mostly comprised of threats. (which I'll explain below I guess)

The majority of decks that perform well play Force of Will. And this has only been increasing. The Hulk-Flash metagame actually had more archetypical diversity than the current one.


Mind twist may or may not be warranted (which is another discussion entirely). Balance allows you to set up a turn to break the symmetry and resolve a threat on a nearly empty board. Strip mine threatens your entire mana base, despite your attempts to play around wasteland, and is a huge threat when paired with recursion. And Mana drain enables a turn for the control player to essentially use his opponents mana to resolve his own spells. It is not typically used as the default answer, but a way to play high cost spells.

Force does not set up such plays and is used for protection at a steep prices that only pays off in certain circumstances that few current decks can realistically set up. That's all.

This is stupid. You're setting up a difference without a distinction. Force of Will pushes through your key threat or counters their key spell so you can win. Thoughtseize removes their answers or their key spells. All you're doing is describing disruption in some ad hoc way to try and make it sound like it's not still disruption.

[Xero]

If people think blue is too powerful, why advovate bannning Force of Will and not Brainstorm? Brainstorm is in every non-merfolk blue deck, and its an important piece in both Storm combo decks and in :u: based combo-control decks. Isn't the statement "the majority of decks that perform well play X" as true for Brainstorm as it is for Force of Will?

[Zunam]

I have a slightly different view on Force of Will and it's high presence:

Force of Will isn't played because of its ability to stop combo (it's only one of it's uses). It is played because Legacy is a quite fast format with a lot of first turn threats that will break your neck fast when unanswered (especially when loosing the die roll).

There are Lackeys, Chalice at 1 (devastating for a lot of decks), Manabond,... to just name some of the worst non-combo cards.

Of course there are other answers to these cards. Let's look at Swords to Plowshares one of the obvious answers to First-Turn Lackey.
It does work, yes. But how consistent is this?
Packing Path to exile into your deck in addition might solve this issue but is a quite high commitment.

This is true for all specialized hate. There simply needs to be a cheap general-answer to problems in such a fast format in my opinion. Otherwise the dice roll will matter a bit too much and the paper/rock/scissors (by having to run dedicated hate) will matter more and more to have fun.

This is also why I feel that banning of Force of Will would also lead to a very drastic change (more drastic than every other banning in Legacy) and would basically mean a completely different format.
Combo might not get out of control but will definitely get better and will demand new answers. No one knows what would happen, but... exaggeration a bit to show a possible degeneration... Red Chalice Aggro VS Green Chalice Aggro Vs Black Chalice Aggro is an much more "unfun" environment in my opinion.

On a personal side note:
I never lost to Force of Will alone (with the exception of the times when I was playing combo) but a lot to the threats it is meant to answer.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

There's a slight gap, since Tendrils tends to play Brainstorm but not Force, and Merfolk plays Force but not Brainstorm. But the latter preys on decks that do run Brainstorm. I agree that it would be the most sensible card to ban after Tendrils or Goyf. In my mind those are the three cards that could reasonably be banned at the moment, and Brainstorm would be the least disruptive banning. So probably the most likely first shot.

[swoop]

And now, the conclusion:

First we ban Tendrils, then we ban Goyf, and last but not least card to get the axe is Brainstorm.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

And now, the conclusion:

First we ban Tendrils, then we ban Goyf, and last but not least card to get the axe is Brainstorm.

Banning one would be more than enough for a single round. The problem here is other strategies being systemically strangled, but there's not an immense sense of urgency. Although if you're implying that it's unreasonable to ever ban cards that people like playing, I would think that's another argument for giving Tendrils the axe. Hell, you could unban Mystical Tutor, Hermit Druid and Dragon at the same time if people want to complain about it.

[Meekrab]

The majority of decks that perform well play Force of Will. And this has only been increasing. The Hulk-Flash metagame actually had more archetypical diversity than the current one.
I'd really like to understand how Sneak and Tell Emrakul is the same archetype as New Horizons is the same as Black Splash Merfolk is the same as JaceTMS Deedstill.

I mean you could start by explaining how a control deck with no creatures in that can't win before approximately turn 30 can possibly be the same archetype as one that attempts to swing with a 15/15 Annihilator 6 on turn two...

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

I'd really like to understand how Sneak and Tell Emrakul is the same archetype as New Horizons is the same as Black Splash Merfolk is the same as JaceTMS Deedstill.

I mean you could start by explaining how a control deck with no creatures in that can't win before approximately turn 30 can possibly be the same archetype as one that attempts to swing with a 15/15 Annihilator 6 on turn two...

During the era of Hulk-Flash we had numerous builds of the deck that all relied on different disruption components. The most common lists ran Force, Daze, and Duress, but some ran Top and Counterbalance, some ran a heavy discard component including Therapies. Some ran more permanent removal or board sweepers, some ran Gro creatures main or side, but they all killed you with Hulk-Flash, so to the average player they were the exact same deck. Now we have twenty different decks running 16 total copies of [Brainstorm d/or Ponder d/or Counterbalance d/or Daze d/or Stifle d/or Jace, the Mind Sculptor d/or Spell Pierce d/or Counterspell d/or Standstill] + 4 Force of Will, but with different kill conditions, and people wonder how the format could possibly be more diverse than it is!

What a difference is achieved by switching between the active and passive tense.

[Jeff Kruchkow]

During the era of Hulk-Flash we had numerous builds of the deck that all relied on different disruption components. The most common lists ran Force, Daze, and Duress, but some ran Top and Counterbalance, some ran a heavy discard component including Therapies. Some ran more permanent removal or board sweepers, some ran Gro creatures main or side, but they all killed you with Hulk-Flash, so to the average player they were the exact same deck. Now we have twenty different decks running 16 total copies of [Brainstorm d/or Ponder d/or Counterbalance d/or Daze d/or Stifle d/or Jace, the Mind Sculptor d/or Spell Pierce d/or Counterspell d/or Standstill] + 4 Force of Will, but with different kill conditions, and people wonder how the format could possibly be more diverse than it is!

What a difference is achieved by switching between the active and passive tense.

A deck with 4 force/4 jace/4 counterspell/4 brainstorm/4 Standstill can be wildly different than a deck with 4 brainstorm/4 ponder/4 force/4 daze/ pierce. Saying they are practically the same deck is like saying that Team America and New Horizons are the same because they both run stifle/waste/goyf.

Yes, the amount of card diversity in Legacy could be bigger. But to be honest, I'd rather it wasn't. There is enough diversity to have the meta not be Deck and Anti-Deck and a smaller meta lends itself to a more skill dependent tournament enviroment. Ban goyf, tendrils and force and all of a sudden there are 300 viable decks and it becomes impossible to metagame and tournaments come down to dodging bad matchups.

[Meekrab]

What a difference is achieved by switching between the active and passive tense.
None of that was at all relevant to the question I posed, except I guess the part where you admitted we have 20 different decks that all run some good blue cards. Holy Homarids, blue is good in eternal, ban something quick!

[CorpT]

At this point aren't we just feeding a troll obsessed with banning something? I'm pretty sure IBA is just talking to hear himself talk.

[Pippin]

Is this still going on?

Can't people that want FoW banned just make their own format? Or wait and hope that wizards make "overextended", from masks onwards - without FoW? Move to something like CYOS?

In the latest Legacy GP there was an abundance of different deck strategies - in top 8, and outside of it. I call that healthy. Hell, after a long while we are finally seeing return of Pernicious Deed and rock variants on big scene. Those are decks against whom FoW isn't that hot due to lots of discard. Does that mean that the metagame is actually adapting to fight FoW and Brainstorm decks? Certainly seems like it to me.
But why wait for format to sort itself out... lets just axe FoW, then Brainstorm - and while we are at it - tendrils, nacatl, loam, and whatever else Lax suggested.


ps. lemme just add this here, even though its tied with data IBA pulled out on that other thread. You know why FoW and Brainstorm are getting played more and more? In my own opinion its almost purely because of Jace 2.0. That card is insane, so its only natural that: A) people will fight it at first (goyf situation from years ago)
B) start playing Jace 2.0 more and more
I mean, card is literally warping every format out there, and legacy is most likely next. There are already claims to get it restricted in T1 - even though people laughed at it at first.

[Amon Amarth]

Yes, the amount of card diversity in Legacy could be bigger. But to be honest, I'd rather it wasn't. There is enough diversity to have the meta not be Deck and Anti-Deck and a smaller meta lends itself to a more skill dependent tournament enviroment. Ban goyf, tendrils and force and all of a sudden there are 300 viable decks and it becomes impossible to metagame and tournaments come down to dodging bad matchups.

I think is somewhat of a problem right now; Legacy feels too diverse and it's very hard to metagame in this format with so many viable decks and linears are all over the place. I'm glad there are constraints like Storm Combo to actually weed out some of these decks, honestly.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

So the argument from the Legacy-is-healthy crowd amounts to: I like a format where 60% of the top table decks play Force of Will.

Well, as long as we know where everyone stands.

[swoop]

Its better to play a single card in 60% of the decks, then to have a single deck that is 60% of the field.

[Oiolosse]

Force of Will's drawback is nullified mostly by blue's ability to draw and manipulate. Brainstorm > Force of Will on a whole. No, not at stopping first turn nutz but in terms of smoothing out the consistency of play and bringing home the win in the long term, yes. I personally don't want to see Brainstorm banned but I think the format would be healthier in the event.

A solid blue hoser at 1 or 2 mana would be fantastic though.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

Its better to play a single card in 60% of the decks, then to have a single deck that is 60% of the field.

So don't do anything due to a speculative fear that something else will happen?

[Cthuloo]

So don't do anything due to a speculative fear that something else will happen?

Well... yes. IMHO it's yet too hard to tell were the format is going. Let things settle down a bit. If non-blue/non-combo appears to be cut out of the format, then it will be time to stop and think. Hitting something with the banhammer now can really have unpredictable consequences,

It wuould be great, instead, if Wizards could come out with something new to hose combo for non-blue decks, something you can throw 4x in your board and have a fair chance, like grave hate for dredge.

[SpikeyMikey]

I feel that the banning of MT was a net positive for combo. Prior to the MT ban, there were 2 tier 1 combo decks, AnT and Reanimator. The banning of MT has fractured the combo paradigm and you now have a dozen different splinter combo decks all competing for top honors. No single deck is as strong as AnT or Reanimator, but because there are so many variant paths to victory, it becomes more difficult to defend against combo. You need to have answers and you need to have them quickly, but the variety of things you need to have answers to makes it impossible to have board against everything, so you have to hope you get paired against the "right" combo. Or you can play dedicated control like Landstill and lose your ass to all the aggro control decks.

[paK0]

So don't do anything due to a speculative fear that something else will happen?

More like don't try to fix anything that ain't broken.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

More like don't try to fix anything that ain't broken.

When is something broken? When a single card dominates 60% of placings? 66%? 75%? 90%?

[Sims]

Its better to play a single card in 60% of the decks, then to have a single deck that is 60% of the field.

But when, aside from the obvious Flash, has any deck reached 60% of the field? What indication do we have that doing something to a card that is in 60% of the decks, will result in 1 deck becoming 60% of the field?

[JonBarber]

When is something broken? When a single card dominates 60% of placings? 66%? 75%? 90%?

I think part of this is a false correlation. Beginning players tend to play aggro decks because they are easy to play, linear, and its hard to mess up too badly. The better players become, the more versatile they want their decks to become. Brainstorm is a card that offers a lot of versatility, and rewards players who can use it better. As previously stated, if your playing brainstorm in a deck, your probably going to play force because of the high number of blue cards as well as the versatility that force also offers. You then get the trend of better players playing force of will. These players were likely to top 8 to begin with because they are "good" (they make very few play mistakes and are able to out play their opponents) not just because they were using force of will. As of right now, blue offers the most versatility of any color. Most other colors have a fairly linear plan. Force of Will isn't a "super broken card" its just a card that good players are going to tend to play. The deck (and the player) who are best able to adapt to all of their opponents throughout a tournament are the ones who are likely to do the best. There are PLENTY of people who play force of will and don't do well. If you ban force of will, good players will just find the next most versatile cards and play them. And we'll end up with another thread about how broken X is.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

But when, aside from the obvious Flash, has any deck reached 60% of the field? What indication do we have that doing something to a card that is in 60% of the decks, will result in 1 deck becoming 60% of the field?

Hulk-Flash wasn't 60% of the field. Raffinity wasn't 60% of the field. I don't know of any format where one deck was 60% of the field.


I think part of this is a false correlation. Beginning players tend to play aggro decks because they are easy to play, linear, and its hard to mess up too badly. The better players become, the more versatile they want their decks to become. Brainstorm is a card that offers a lot of versatility, and rewards players who can use it better. As previously stated, if your playing brainstorm in a deck, your probably going to play force because of the high number of blue cards as well as the versatility that force also offers. You then get the trend of better players playing force of will. These players were likely to top 8 to begin with because they are "good" (they make very few play mistakes and are able to out play their opponents) not just because they were using force of will. As of right now, blue offers the most versatility of any color. Most other colors have a fairly linear plan. Force of Will isn't a "super broken card" its just a card that good players are going to tend to play. The deck (and the player) who are best able to adapt to all of their opponents throughout a tournament are the ones who are likely to do the best. There are PLENTY of people who play force of will and don't do well. If you ban force of will, good players will just find the next most versatile cards and play them. And we'll end up with another thread about how broken X is.

Sooooooooooo this isn't what "false correlation" means. In effect you're arguing that Force and Brainstorm are so good that every deck should run them, or that every deck that doesn't run them is wrong. This is clearly an argument for bannings, then. No card should be an automatic inclusion in every deck. That's the very definition of warping.

[majikal]

I keep reading IBA's posts, but all the letters just look like W, A, and H.

Seriously, who cares if the format warps around certain cards? Look at Vintage. It is built around Jewelry and Null Rod. Likewise Standard is warped around Jace and Bloodbraid Elf.

Every format is going to have defining cards. Force of Will is a defining card of Legacy. Get over it. When it's one deck that the format is warping around, we can cry that the sky is falling.

[JonBarber]

Sooooooooooo this isn't what "false correlation" means. In effect you're arguing that Force and Brainstorm are so good that every deck should run them, or that every deck that doesn't run them is wrong. This is clearly an argument for bannings, then. No card should be an automatic inclusion in every deck. That's the very definition of warping.

Stop beating your head against the wall for two seconds. Your argument has been "60% of top 8 decks play force, therefore force is broken." But in reality, 60% of top 8 are good players. Good players play force of will because its versatile. Good players like versatile decks.

[paK0]

When is something broken? When a single card dominates 60% of placings? 66%? 75%? 90%?

Make that Deck and I'd agree. A lot of blue based decks play Force, so what. As long as we have an open field I couldn't care less about a single card showing up in a lot of lists. You can play literally every style you want, Combo, Control, Aggro or any mashup of those, I would rather keep it that way.

[DragoFireheart]

Sooooooooooo this isn't what "false correlation" means. In effect you're arguing that Force and Brainstorm are so good that every deck should run them, or that every deck that doesn't run them is wrong. This is clearly an argument for bannings, then. No card should be an automatic inclusion in every deck. That's the very definition of warping.

Except this is not the case regardless of what he is arguing.

A card being good is not an argument for banning it.

A card warping the format is not an argument for banning it.

A card warping the format in such a way that every viable deck is either the deck with the card or a anti-deck (Skullclamp for example) IS a reason for banning it.

[ummon]

Except this is not the case regardless of what he is arguing.

A card being good is not an argument for banning it.

A card warping the format is not an argument for banning it.

A card warping the format in such a way that every viable deck is either the deck with the card or a anti-deck (Skullclamp for example) IS a reason for banning it.

This is just plain wrong. We play legacy not vintage. We want card diversity. When a card warps the format, it should be considered for banning. It doesn't mean it has to be banned. However, it is certainly an argument for its banning.

[SpikeyMikey]

This is just plain wrong. We play legacy not vintage. We want card diversity. When a card warps the format, it should be considered for banning. It doesn't mean it has to be banned. However, it is certainly an argument for its banning.

So you subscribe to the Ari Lax school of bannings? Good cards necessarily force people to play around them. That's like arguing for banning creatures because they force people to run removal.

[swoop]

This is just plain wrong. We play legacy not vintage. We want card diversity. When a card warps the format, it should be considered for banning. It doesn't mean it has to be banned. However, it is certainly an argument for its banning.

We have diversity. We wouldn't have it if those cards were banned.

[DrJones]

How do you play around Force in the following cases?

a) when Force is used to make sure a combo kill resolves
b) when Force is used to make sure you don't play your second or third turns (the most important ones in legacy)

[heroicraptor]

Hulk-Flash wasn't 60% of the field. Raffinity wasn't 60% of the field. I don't know of any format where one deck was 60% of the field.

Jund, before Worldwake.

[SpikeyMikey]

How do you play around Force in the following cases?

a) when Force is used to make sure a combo kill resolves
b) when Force is used to make sure you don't play your second or third turns (the most important ones in legacy)

A is a concern. B is not. Control does not pack raw draw anymore, so they're answering you on a primarily 1 for 1 basis. 2-for-1ing themselves is in your favor as long as you've got some threat density.

[AriLax]

Jund, before Worldwake.

Jund was not even close to 60% of the metagame.It may have cracked 60% of the top 8s at an event or two. That is all. It was not 60% of the top 8 pool over a prolonged period. At it's most dominant it was around 40% of the metagame and 50% of the top 8.

Also, SpikeyMikey, banning cards for reasons other than single handedly dominating a format is reasonable. If a card is oppressively good to the extent it drastically limits the playable options from a card pool, it is considerable to ban it assuming that said ban would open up more playable options. I don't actually think Force of Will does this (if anything, it opens up the field), but there are other cards that do in Legacy (Wild Nacatl comes to mind).

[DrJones]

B is a concern because it's not used by control, but by Tempo decks like Merfolk, Bant NO, or that new UG Madness that have fast clocks and don't mind the small impact of card disadvantage when compared with the huge tempo swing. They use Force, Daze and Submerge because they are free and can cast them without any tempo loss.

Compare it with cards like swords to plowshares or counterspell, that require you to leave lands untapped and thus to choose between developing your game OR defending from the opponent, and then you will understand why FoW is heavily played but discard is not. Discard cannot steal the opponent's turn, but it's rather you the one using up a turn to cast it.

[android]

The argument that A is the greater concern is also weak in that in the case where combo has sculpted the perfect hand of X combo pieces (sometimes as few as 2 cards but often more) + whatever redundancy + tutors + mana generators +& etc. and is actually ready to go off and assuming you actually have something in hand to stop it and gasp and etc.<- run on combo sentence.

At this point, one might argue that FoW is actually part of the combo. It is required to *pardon the pun* Force the win through. Now if I'm going to come in here (particularly on this forum) and present a combo that can in fact end a game but requires 3+ cards to make this happen, most of which are simply facilitators (which FoW is in the case stated), it would likely be considered a weak combo until proven in a large scale tournament.

I would contend that if anyone wants to argue for FoW being on the chopping block, they should stick to the frequency in which it appears rather than the case of the unstoppable combo. In fact it strengthens the argument for it's inclusion as it is often the very answer to the dilemma which in turn supports the frequency in which it appears and the diversity of roles it provides. Both guarantee and denial.

[yankeedave]

B is a concern because it's not used by control, but by Tempo decks like Merfolk, Bant NO, or that new UG Madness that have fast clocks and don't mind the small impact of card disadvantage when compared with the huge tempo swing. They use Force, Daze and Submerge because they are free and can cast them without any tempo loss.

Compare it with cards like swords to plowshares or counterspell, that require you to leave lands untapped and thus to choose between developing your game OR defending from the opponent, and then you will understand why FoW is heavily played but discard is not. Discard cannot steal the opponent's turn, but it's rather you the one using up a turn to cast it.

Seriously, does every thread you post in have to be about Force? I get your points, and while I may not agree with them, you are entitled to them, but please stop turning every discussion into your personal quest. Write a letter to Mark Rosewater if its that serious for you.

[frogboy]

Force of Will is usually the worst card in Force of Will decks unless you desperately need a turn zero counter. Arguments that Force is undercosted are laughable. The card, a blue one, is a real and significant cost.

Jack, are you arguing that Force needs to be banned because it's too powerful? Because it makes games crushingly unfun? Because a lot of people play it?

edit: Plow isn't a tempo generator wtfffffffffffffff

[swoop]

a) when Force is used to make sure a combo kill resolves

WRONG!

a) TES isn't playing FoW
b) Spanish Inq isnt playing FoW
c) Combo Elves! aren't playing FoW
d ANT isn't playing FoW

(most of the builds)

some combo decks do play fow (high tide, dream halls, aluren) but those arent top tier.

How do you argue this?

[Gheizen64]

Force of Will is usually the worst card in Force of Will decks unless you desperately need a turn zero counter. Arguments that Force is undercosted are laughable. The card, a blue one, is a real and significant cost.

Jack, are you arguing that Force needs to be banned because it's too powerful? Because it makes games crushingly unfun? Because a lot of people play it?

edit: Plow isn't a tempo generator wtfffffffffffffff

No, i believe Jack was saying that the fact that force is overplayed probably mean that Tendril put a design constraint too hard on decks, as the only strong answer to tendril based deck are heavy permission blue decks. I believe also he started suspected this after Columbus.

[DrJones]

WRONG!

a) TES isn't playing FoW
b) Spanish Inq isnt playing FoW
c) Combo Elves! aren't playing FoW
d ANT isn't playing FoW

(most of the builds)

some combo decks do play fow (high tide, dream halls, aluren) but those arent top tier.

How do you argue this?Aluren is one of the top decks in MOL, but building that deck in paper costs a kidney and a half. Dream Halls has the problem that there are currently far more efficient uses of Show and Tell than Dream Halls, for example the Emrakul decks and Reanimator decks that are Top Tier right now. High Tide has the problem that his milling combo is foiled with so many Emrakul and Progenitus around there, and that Countertop (with its own set of FoW) is stronger against it, usually running a faster combo of its own (dreadnought or thopters). That is, it loses to other blue combo decks.

I've never seen SI or Combo Elves ever doing well in a big tournament, and ANT and TES decks routinely lose to FoW decks that play FoW the right way, that is, either to protect their combo or in a Tempo deck. Note how all the combo players agree that Force of Will in a slow deck cannot defend against them, and that Bryant Cook was in a minefield with 6 decks with FoW in the Top 8.

[AriLax]

Aluren is one of the top decks in MOL, but building that deck in paper costs a kidney and a half. Dream Halls has the problem that there are currently far more efficient uses of Show and Tell than Dream Halls, for example the Emrakul decks and Reanimator decks that are Top Tier right now. High Tide has the problem that his milling combo is foiled with so many Emrakul and Progenitus around there, and that Countertop (with its own set of FoW) is stronger against it, usually using a faster combo of its own (dreadnought or thopters).

I've never seen SI or Combo Elves ever doing well in a big tournament, and ANT and TES decks routinely lose to FoW decks that play FoW the right way, that is, either to protect their combo or in a Tempo deck. Note how all the combo players agree that Force of Will in a slow deck cannot defend against them, and that Bryant Cook was in a minefield with 6 FoW in the Top 8.

1. Aluren greatly benefits on MODO from the lack of Rishidan Port, which hinders non-blue mana denial strategies and Goblins specifically, which can actually just cold your combo if it isn't backed up.

2. SI is a glass cannon.

3. Combo Elves beats Force by just attacking.

4. ANT/TES actually smash non-CB Top force decks, but that is because the decks are too good to begin with.

5. Besides that, I agree Force combo is the second most broken thing in Legacy behind Lion's Eye Diamond.

[kinda]

1. Aluren greatly benefits on MODO from the lack of Rishidan Port, which hinders non-blue mana denial strategies and Goblins specifically, which can actually just cold your combo if it isn't backed up.

2. SI is a glass cannon.

3. Combo Elves beats Force by just attacking.

4. ANT/TES actually smash non-CB Top force decks, but that is because the decks are too good to begin with.

5. Besides that, I agree Force combo is the second most broken thing in Legacy behind Lion's Eye Diamond.

I agree with the points (ok I'm not sure about 3)...but "force combo" is vague. In my experience most combo decks that can support force of will (minus solidarity these are the decks sporting the best compact combos) aren't viable or at least can't compare to ANT/TES/DDFT (either due to a major weakness or just power/consistency). Those would be: solidarity, aluren, dream halls, painterstone, hive mind, hypergenesis, aeon bridge, and breakfast. Even the two-three I do believe can compete with protection tendrils variants are completely disregarded by most.

[Phoenix Ignition]

Aluren is one of the top decks in MOL, but building that deck in paper costs a kidney and a half.
When has cost really been a barrier to winning? There were a large number of pros playing Aluren at GP columbus but none of them top 8ed. I've seen it played with 4x Imperial Recruiter (which, if you check the thread, is called the worse version) in the local metagame and do decently, but it isn't a broken deck by any means.


Dream Halls has the problem that there are currently far more efficient uses of Show and Tell than Dream Halls, for example the Emrakul decks and Reanimator decks that are Top Tier right now.
These decks, especially reanimator, aren't putting up consistent results at all right now. None of them seem to be broken like you'd suggest.


High Tide has the problem that his milling combo is foiled with so many Emrakul and Progenitus around there, and that Countertop (with its own set of FoW) is stronger against it, usually running a faster combo of its own (dreadnought or thopters). That is, it loses to other blue combo decks.
Know how I know you're just saying BS now? "Usually running a faster combo of its own (dreadnought or THOPTERS)." Okay man, I know you've been trying to act like you really believe what you say, but there is no way in hell that a thopter deck is fast. I've never seen a format with so many draws in my life until I went to the thopter/foundry ridden Columbus. Thopters fast, wow....


I've never seen SI or Combo Elves ever doing well in a big tournament, and ANT and TES decks routinely lose to FoW decks that play FoW the right way, that is, either to protect their combo or in a Tempo deck. Note how all the combo players agree that Force of Will in a slow deck cannot defend against them, and that Bryant Cook was in a minefield with 6 decks with FoW in the Top 8.

You do realize Bryant won through plenty of FoW decks to get there right? Go read his report. Okay, now if FoW was entirely so broken how did he get there without running it? Honestly were you complaining about FoW even when the biggest decks were Lands vs Zoo?

Should it be our job to constantly search out the best cards in legacy and ban them? When does it stop? How many people really think that FoW is truly a broken card. Even if decks that play it on average have a higher win percentage, does anyone truly think this is a broken card?

[JonBarber]

Hey, uhh, funny story...

http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?5460-DTBF-Philosophy-Deck-Selection/page2

Whats the number one deck? It must be a force of will deck right? Hrm... Nope, its zoo. Awkward, it doesn't run tendrils OR force of will. Whats number two? Merfolk! Sure it plays force, but its usually seen as a "good" matchup for tendrils. And whats number three? GOBLINS! Tendrils's EASIEST matchup. None of these are anti-tendrils decks. If tendrils was "warping" the format like earlier suggested, one would think the top 3 slots would be owned by either tendrils decks, or anti tendrils decks. But the top 3 are actually tendril's 3 easiest matchups. I'd say that its pretty safe to say tendrils isn't warping the format.

Also, force of will is not in 2 out of the 3 top decks, and force of will is the worst card in merfolk.

As far as diversity goes, only one deck is double digits when it comes to percent of the format, and thats zoo! A non-tendrils, non-force deck. There was percentages for over 40 decks! Name any other format that has 40 playable decks that all make top 8's. Legacy is an extremely diverse format, and the current leader for top 8's is made entirely of the colors that people here have been arguing don't stand a chance against "broken" decks.

[Gheizen64]

Hey, uhh, funny story...

http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?5460-DTBF-Philosophy-Deck-Selection/page2

Whats the number one deck? It must be a force of will deck right? Hrm... Nope, its zoo. Awkward, it doesn't run tendrils OR force of will. Whats number two? Merfolk! Sure it plays force, but its usually seen as a "good" matchup for tendrils. And whats number three? GOBLINS! Tendrils's EASIEST matchup. None of these are anti-tendrils decks. If tendrils was "warping" the format like earlier suggested, one would think the top 3 slots would be owned by either tendrils decks, or anti tendrils decks. But the top 3 are actually tendril's 3 easiest matchups. I'd say that its pretty safe to say tendrils isn't warping the format.

Also, force of will is not in 2 out of the 3 top decks, and force of will is the worst card in merfolk.

As far as diversity goes, only one deck is double digits when it comes to percent of the format, and thats zoo! A non-tendrils, non-force deck. There was percentages for over 40 decks! Name any other format that has 40 playable decks that all make top 8's. Legacy is an extremely diverse format, and the current leader for top 8's is made entirely of the colors that people here have been arguing don't stand a chance against "broken" decks.

If you bothered to read this thread... nevermind i'm bored.

This topic was doomed the moment Dr. Jones posted in it anyway.

[swoop]

When has cost really been a barrier to winning? There were a large number of pros playing Aluren at GP columbus but none of them top 8ed. I've seen it played with 4x Imperial Recruiter (which, if you check the thread, is called the worse version) in the local metagame and do decently, but it isn't a broken deck by any means.

This.

It's not exactly "worse" version (I play the deck) but its abit more expensive than the "other" version. A bit means you need 4 recruiters that are 150$ so just by adding those cards you need 600$.

The problem in legacy wouldn't be in my opinion either FoW, or Brainstorm, but "OBSCURE" cards that net prices like Imp. Recruiter or such, from those shitty sets like Portal which got legal just recently.

[majikal]

Can we please just ban all discussion of what needs/doesn't need to be banned unless it's posted in the designated sticky thread? This shit is getting really old.

[ummon]

http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?14662-All-B-R-update-speculation&p=484146&viewfull=1#post484146