A Red Mental Misstep

[Draener]

An interesting idea came up in the Ban List Discussion thread, and I was wondering what more of you thought on this issue. If mental misstep was red ( or the most underrepresented color, whatever it is ), should it still get banned? There has been a lot of calls to end blue's dominance, and that mental misstep is driving a lot of this talk, so would changing misstep to be red solve this problem?

I personally would not care what color it is in, as long as I get to keep a card to keep combo in check that is accessible to all colors.

[Broham]

It is accessible to all colors though. I think this card opens options up for many decks, regardless of color.

[CorpT]

Snapcaster should have been Red. Making Misstep red is not that big of a deal. It can't pitch to Force and will cost life more often, but that's it.

[rufus]

Seems like the red power level equivalent of Mental Mistep might be be something like:

Red/Phyrexian
Flip two coins. Add :r: to your mana pool unless both come up tails.
Draw a Card

Hard to imagine a deck not playing that....

[dontbiteitholmes]

Uh oh, someone mentioned Misstep, cue the fucking whiners.

[TeenieBopper]

Uhh... red already has a Mental Misstep. Shit, I don't even play Magic and I know this.

[TkDodo]

If mental misstep was red ( or the most underrepresented color, whatever it is ), should it still get banned?

That implies that Mental Misstep should be banned as it is....
But seriously, what's the difference if it were red? That blue decks would always have to pay two life, in comparison to the 80% they do it now? Merfolk would still play it. I would still play it. Most Stoneblade decks have Volcanics anyway if they splash red for REB in the side.
Btw, if Dismember were green, Merfolk would still play it. Who cares about life anyway...

[lordofthepit]

A Phyrexian mana Pyroblast would do the trick.

[Deviruchi]

A Phyrexian mana Pyroblast would do the trick.
When they wrote about phyrexian mana I was thinking about phyrexian red elemental blast. I was almost sure that it would be a good solution to blue format, also a nice way to fight powerful Brainstorms. Later I saw Mental Misstep in the famous spoiler and I just started to /facepalm /facepalm /facepalm...

[Lancer]

Making the card red meaning it cannot be pitched to force of will.

Sure it would help but I doubt wizards would change the color of the card, it's better for them to ban Brainstorm.

[DragoFireheart]

Jesus Christ all this would do is force blue decks to play red for the red Mental Misstep. IT WOULD NOT CHANGE ANYTHING. I'm honesty sick of hearing people whine about every single card that becomes popular and making idiotic arguments as to what would end "blue's" dominance.

[Rizso]

A phyrexian mana pyroblast would probly be even worse then the current mental misstep. That would mean red would be played even less.

Brainfart R
Instant
Whenever an opponent would draw a card this turn, he or she draws a card and chose a card and put in on top of his library instead.
Cant be countered by spells or abilties.
Draw Card.

This would be quite a better solution then then a phyrexia mana pyroblast.

[Angelfire]

Red should get more strong cards, but Red Mental Misstep is NOT what it wants, needs or deserves. Blue is overly dominant. Just ban Brainstorm and leave Mental Misstep alone. Brainstorm is problematic. It does way too much on top of being a card fixing cantrip. In combination with Fetchlands it gives too much card quality and card advantage. It also protects blue from cards like Thoughtseize/Hymm (haha, hide my Show and Tell) which it shouldn't be doing in addition to everything else it does. This wouldn't ruin any decks, just take them down closer to the power level they should be.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

Uh oh, someone mentioned Misstep, cue the fucking whiners.

Unless you're advocating unbanning Flash, YawgWill, and Black Lotus, I really think people need to shut the fuck up forever with this whole routine of calling every suggestion of altering the power level of the format "whining" as an attempt to dismiss it without serious thought.


@OP: It wouldn't affect the power level much. People might play slightly less of a blue-base, or be more likely to cut Force and run blue mainly for Brainstorm.

[Kuma]

Even if Mental Misstep was red, it would still show up in blue decks most often because it fits their strategy better. The reason blue decks run Mental Misstep and most non-blue decks don't has little to do with occasionally saving yourself two life. Mental Misstep is better when surrounded with other countermagic and control cards.

We're at the point where you're running a blue deck with Mental Misstep or you're not truly playing to win. Banning Mental Misstep would be a step in the right direction to restoring format diversity.

[JustPAT4]

Red Misstep seems like a peculiar idea, but I'd of course run it as long as it fit my strategy.

There seems to be a large camp with two factions frustrated by Blue's perceived power level in relation to the other colors.

One faction fingers Misstep as the culprit and argues it has tipped the scale too heavily in favor of Blue, reduced format diversity, and slowed the format down.

The other argues that Brainstorm is the true blue powerhouse by increasing consistency and offering unparallelled card quality among the colors.

My subjective view is that, in a vacuum, Brainstorm is the strongest card in the format because of the consistency and versatility it offers for a single U. Yet banning Brainstorm, while alternatives do exist, seems as though it would tremendously weaken a wide variety of strategies that have been popular since the inception of the format.

I was actually glad in May that they printed a card, playable in all colors if you wish, that answers the strongest card in the format like nobody's business. Misstep counters spells that cost 1. That's it. If you can't win because you had a 1 drop get countered, you should perhaps consider another strategy. In the meantime, I like my card that "counters target Brainstorm."

Banning Misstep, strengthens Brainstorm. Banning Brainstorm, drives a spike through a wide range of reasonable, tried and true eternal strategies (and for many players, especially skilled players, reduces the fun of the game, which is the point right?).

I say do nothing. Not yet. The format may still adapt. I'm still having fun.

[Draener]

I am also of the opinion that changing the color would do little to affect the power level of the card, but I mainly made the post because of a decent number of players pointing to how much of the top16 decks have blue in them as a reason to look at banning mental misstep. This seems strange to me, as mental misstep is essencially a colorless card (although pitching to force is non-negligable). I would most certainly still play the card, and would be relatively unaffected by the change, as I get the most use of the card jamming it into mostly non-blue fair decks so combo players don't get a free bye.

[sroncor1]

If you are that scared of blue's power level then just play Volcanic Islands or other red Duals and run blast effects. I honestly feel as if people have stopped actually playing magic anymore and just post ideas to bitch about. Red is currently a support color in the format and a great foil to blue. I understand zoo players being sad with Mental Misstep, but really it slowing the format down is ok. Magic changes. I wish a bunch of cards from Mirage/Tempest were still playable but the format moves and evolves. The reason Legacy is great is bc I can still play those cards. They may not be great but I can have a great time playing with them, and that should be enough


Seth

[Kuma]

If you are that scared of blue's power level then just play Volcanic Islands or other red Duals and run blast effects.

People do that. It's called NO RUG. See also Servant, Painter's.

[Zilla]

I understand zoo players being sad with Mental Misstep
Misstep is amazing for Zoo. It actually gives it a chance against combo. Also, the deck runs so many 1 drops that losing 1 to Misstep is rarely a huge problem.

I play both Zoo and Team America, and if Misstep were banned I'd miss it a hell of a lot more in Zoo than in TA.

[dontbiteitholmes]

Unless you're advocating unbanning Flash, YawgWill, and Black Lotus, I really think people need to shut the fuck up forever with this whole routine of calling every suggestion of altering the power level of the format "whining" as an attempt to dismiss it without serious thought.


@OP: It wouldn't affect the power level much. People might play slightly less of a blue-base, or be more likely to cut Force and run blue mainly for Brainstorm.

Please don't take the language in my response as flaming you, because it's not meant to be (more of a general rant) but...

Fuck all this fucking whining bullshit, all people ever want to do is fucking complain about ANY FUCKING CARD that is strong at more than one event in a row. I mean we have literally been going in circles about this since ATS was THE deck. I could name at least 20 cards that people dog piled on and cried at some point was unfair and needed to be banned immediately for the "health of the format" that have seen basically zero play in the last 18 months. Basically people were right about this TWICE so far. Once was Survival and the other was Flash (which doesn't even count because it was a wayward errata that unleashed that monster and everyone immediately knew it was OP) and both of those cards were beyond the pale in their prime. Now a days everyone complains literally the moment a card shows up as more than 8x in a single SCG top 8. Remember a month ago when "OMG Show and Tell = unstoppable!!!1!" now it barely seems to matter that it was ever a deck.

Now everyone is complaining about a card that only counters 1cmc spells. "Oh my Gawd, so broken, now I can't Swords a Stoneforge Mystic because they run Misstep." How about run a 2 mana answer or Dismember? Problem solved. "Oh my god, Mental Misstep counters my Aether Vial and Wild Nacatl!" Yeah, you have a lot of room to complain that 2 life and one card counters a ONE MANA ARTIFACT THAT SHITS FREE CREATURES ONTO THE BOARD UNCOUNTERABLY AND A ONE MANA 3/3 BECAUSE THOSE CARDS ARE SO FAIR OTHERWISE, or maybe it's stopping you from playing a turn 1 Putrid Imp and dropping a Grave Troll every turn so you can dredge for 6 or stops you playing a deck that Dark Rituals twice on turn 1 then parlays that into a win or plays a couple Rite of Flames and craps out 12 Goblin tokens on turn 1, you'll have to excuse me if I don't shed a tear for you.

Mental Misstep didn't just shut down the 1 cmc slot it opened up every non-1cmc slot because decks that would previously run 4x Dazes and/or maybe some Spell Pierces now run 4x Missteps and typically have 4 hard counters for non 1cmc spells and maybe 2-3 Dazes. This is fine by me, adapt or suck. I'd much rather have Misstep in the format and have it be risky to rely on 1cmc spells which are generally only played because they are ridiculously powerful for one mana than not have Misstep in the format and have only decks that can run Force be able to answer combo decks that can win before you have a chance to play your first land. Yes it warps to format, yes it slows down the format, and yes it's a really good card, but is it any less fair in the end than 90% of the cards it is countering? I mean can you really complain when a one mana card than answers any non-shroud creature ever printed gets countered and say the counter was unfair?

At this point I'm actually open to talk of banning Brainstorm. That actually seems somewhat reasonable and there are plenty of alternatives available that do practically the same thing at a much lower power level, not to mention it would make discard as viable as it probably should be. Banning Misstep would be dumb though. Almost every time it is countering something that is way more powerful an effect than you should be getting for a single mana.

[Beatusnox]

Fuck all this fucking whining bullshit, all people ever want to do is fucking complain about ANY FUCKING CARD that is strong at more than one event in a row. I mean we have literally been going in circles about this since ATS was THE deck. I could name at least 20 cards that people dog piled on and cried at some point was unfair and needed to be banned immediately for the "health of the format" that have seen basically zero play in the last 18 months. Basically people were right about this TWICE so far. Once was Survival and the other was Flash (which doesn't even count because it was a wayward errata that unleashed that monster and everyone immediately knew it was OP) and both of those cards were beyond the pale in their prime. Now a days everyone complains literally the moment a card shows up as more than 8x in a single SCG top 8. Remember a month ago when "OMG Show and Tell = unstoppable!!!1!" now it barely seems to matter that it was ever a deck.

Now everyone is complaining about a card that only counters 1cmc spells. "Oh my Gawd, so broken, now I can't Swords a Stoneforge Mystic because they run Misstep." How about run a 2 mana answer or Dismember? Problem solved. "Oh my god, Mental Misstep counters my Aether Vial and Wild Nacatl!" Yeah, you have a lot of room to complain that 2 life and one card counters a ONE MANA ARTIFACT THAT SHITS FREE CREATURES ONTO THE BOARD UNCOUNTERABLY AND A ONE MANA 3/3 BECAUSE THOSE CARDS ARE SO FAIR OTHERWISE, or maybe it's stopping you from playing a turn 1 Putrid Imp and dropping a Grave Troll every turn so you can dredge for 6 or stops you playing a deck that Dark Rituals twice on turn 1 then parlays that into a win or plays a couple Rite of Flames and craps out 12 Goblin tokens on turn 1, you'll have to excuse me if I don't shed a tear for you.

Mental Misstep didn't just shut down the 1 cmc slot it opened up every non-1cmc slot because decks that would previously run 4x Dazes and/or maybe some Spell Pierces now run 4x Missteps and typically have 4 hard counters for non 1cmc spells and maybe 2-3 Dazes. This is fine by me, adapt or suck. I'd much rather have Misstep in the format and have it be risky to rely on 1cmc spells which are generally only played because they are ridiculously powerful for one mana than not have Misstep in the format and have only decks that can run Force be able to answer combo decks that can win before you have a chance to play your first land. Yes it warps to format, yes it slows down the format, and yes it's a really good card, but is it any less fair in the end than 90% of the cards it is countering? I mean can you really complain when a one mana card than answers any non-shroud creature ever printed gets countered and say the counter was unfair?

At this point I'm actually open to talk of banning Brainstorm. That actually seems somewhat reasonable and there are plenty of alternatives available that do practically the same thing at a much lower power level, not to mention it would make discard as viable as it probably should be. Banning Misstep would be dumb though. Almost every time it is countering something that is way more powerful an effect than you should be getting for a single mana.
+10
also, i feel that if batterskull was axed the stoneforge decks would not be as dominating while still retaining power, and i feel that either progenitus or natural order should go. i also dislike hive mind, more directly show and tell but feel the deck is still beatable as is.

[dontbiteitholmes]

+10
also, i feel that if batterskull was axed the stoneforge decks would not be as dominating while still retaining power, and i feel that either progenitus or natural order should go. i also dislike hive mind, more directly show and tell but feel the deck is still beatable as is.

Not that I am clamoring for the banning of Brainstorm, because I'm not. If it got banned I would just shrug my shoulders and say, "meh, maybe this was an idea who's time has come." I mean we have Preordain and Ponder as fair alternatives that are both efficient at providing card selection while not letting you ship useless cards for one mana. This would balance out Show and Tell in not letting you ship two lands and making the combo more vulnerable to discard, it would balance Natural Order by making you run an extra Progen in case you drew one or play more "fair" spells like Thirst for Knowledge or Careful Study to discard the one you did draw, and it would balance Misstep in blue decks by not letting you ship it when it turns out to be dead in whatever matchup.

If the alternative to banning Brainstorm is to ban other cards I'd rather Brainstorm take the hit, and anyone who thinks UW Mystic is the best deck in a Legacy where it defines the metagame is missing something.

[Zilla]

+10
also, i feel that if batterskull was axed the stoneforge decks would not be as dominating while still retaining power, and i feel that either progenitus or natural order should go. i also dislike hive mind, more directly show and tell but feel the deck is still beatable as is.
Didn't you just get done quoting a post that rants vehemently against banning key cards in decks that happen to be flavor of the month?

The format will absolutely adapt to Stoneforge and NO. They've been "dominating" for like a month. Those cards aren't even remotely actionable at the moment. There are decks in the format that beat them, it's just that no one seems to want to play them at SCG events. Give it a few weeks.

[dontbiteitholmes]

Didn't you just get done quoting a post that rants vehemently against banning key cards in decks that happen to be flavor of the month?

The format will absolutely adapt to Stoneforge and NO. They've been "dominating" for like a month. Those cards aren't even remotely actionable at the moment. There are decks in the format that beat them, it's just that no one seems to want to play them at SCG events. Give it a few weeks.

I completely tore up UW Mystic decks today losing one game in 3 matches with Enchantress. The matchup is probably like 70% no lie. The one game I lost I completely drew garbage and still almost won. I saw probably 40 cards through Mirri's Guile shuffle and draw and only saw one Enchantress effect all game. The turn I died I had a Sigil in play and 4 cards in hand and couldn't manage to have any one of them be an enchantment so I only could make one angel token which he bounced with Jace and equipped a Batterskull to a Clique fly over my Moat and steal the game.

[Rizso]

+10
also, i feel that if batterskull was axed the stoneforge decks would not be as dominating while still retaining power, and i feel that either progenitus or natural order should go. i also dislike hive mind, more directly show and tell but feel the deck is still beatable as is.

WOW, banning batterskull would be like banning Vengevine durring Survival. Neither Stoneforge or Batterskull are so powerful that they need to get banned in legacy.

TBH only cards that are remotely fair for a ban now atm is NO and SNT but currently im very fine with both cards. There is enought answers that arent to narrow for them to still remain and people can have them in their boards for snt or no matchups and not be dead in other matchups.

Banning mental Misstep wont change the blue dominance, there is just to many powerful blue cards in eternal magic. It would just speed up legacy with 1 or 2 turns instead and kill of most of the control and midrange that have growned sense MM got released. Making most playable 3cc and 4cc dropps that have showned up be unplayable again.

[rufus]

How many cards are out there that are 0 net CA and +1 net mana (or better)? I'm willing to bet the list is quite short.

[Julian23]

@rufus: There are several that come to mind. Like this one (http://magiccards.info/ddh/en/38.html), that one (http://magiccards.info/ddh/en/40.html) as well as a card like this. (http://magiccards.info/ddh/en/79.html) Also, don't forget about this gem right here (http://magiccards.info/ddh/en/77.html) + of course this very special one. (http://magiccards.info/cs/en/154.html)

[DarthVicious]

*Rant about Misstep targets being the actual overpowered cards, thus increasing the power of Misstep*

Mental Misstep didn't just shut down the 1 cmc slot it opened up every non-1cmc slot because decks that would previously run 4x Dazes and/or maybe some Spell Pierces now run 4x Missteps and typically have 4 hard counters for non 1cmc spells and maybe 2-3 Dazes. This is fine by me, adapt or suck.

At this point I'm actually open to talk of banning Brainstorm. That actually seems somewhat reasonable and there are plenty of alternatives available that do practically the same thing at a much lower power level, not to mention it would make discard as viable as it probably should be. Banning Misstep would be dumb though. Almost every time it is countering something that is way more powerful an effect than you should be getting for a single mana.

Agreed. Even with the rant.

I have very few decks. SI, MonoR Goblins, and monoblack. I have the cards to put together Dragon Stompy, Black Stax, TES, Belcher, Dredge, and several others of dramatically decreasing viability. I've had Vials and Lackeys Misstepped and still won the game, and I'm probably a really suboptimal Goblins player. I've had spot discard Misstepped, and still won the game. I've had Culling the Weak Misstepped, and still won that game.

There's this thing called a "brain" you see, and it's a muscle. Meaning it gets stronger the more you use it. Learn how to beat counterspells with your deck of choice. If your deck can't beat counterspells, learn how to play another deck. Adapt or lose, because LOTS of people LOVE playing with counterspells.

[rufus]

@rufus: There are several that come to mind. Like this one (http://magiccards.info/ddh/en/38.html), that one (http://magiccards.info/ddh/en/40.html) as well as a card like this. (http://magiccards.info/ddh/en/79.html) Also, don't forget about this gem right here (http://magiccards.info/ddh/en/77.html) + of course this very special one. (http://magiccards.info/cs/en/154.html)

If you could play many per turn, lands would be like this (http://magiccards.info/un/en/262.html) or that (http://magiccards.info/un/en/262.html). Though you're right, I should have specified non-land.

[Draener]

I find it pretty interesting how close all of the options (except fixing blue's dominance) are. I thought that the results would more heavily favor MM being fine.

[nedleeds]

Yet banning <insert>, while alternatives do exist, seems as though it would tremendously weaken a wide variety of strategies that have been popular since the inception of the format.

- Survival of the Fittest

Still got banned, it was a strong card that required strong commitment to green and was seen in 5-10% of the competitive field. Vengevine gets printed and now it's a turn 2 or 3 beating. They ban the interesting card. Same for Brainstorm, it's been around forever and a half really now after 10+ years does it need banning?

[DragoFireheart]

- Survival of the Fittest

Still got banned, it was a strong card that required strong commitment to green and was seen in 5-10% of the competitive field. Vengevine gets printed and now it's a turn 2 or 3 beating. They ban the interesting card. Same for Brainstorm, it's been around forever and a half really now after 10+ years does it need banning?

- Only if enough people whine about it.

[Humphrey]

Mental Hickup
R/Ph
you cant cast MH when you control an island
counter target 1cc spell

[sdematt]

I think the best solution to this problem is a Spell Snare, but for CMC 1.

-Matt

[GeoSantista]

I think it would make sense flavorwise if Red got to interact with instants and sorceries, as it is the color of immediate gain. More or less how Blue gets to interact positively with artifacts by means of being the science, progress and artifice color.

In that regard, I'd suggest Red to be given counterspells, but not the "counter (any) target spell" type, but rather the "counter target instant or sorcery spell" type. A basic card would cost either RR or 1RR in order to counter an instant or sorcery.

A red Force of Will (and even that name sounds more red than blue) would cost either 3RR or a red card and life loss in order to counter target instant or sorcery spell.

A red Mental Misstep would counter only instants and sorceries. That would suffice to keep combo in check and still let Aether Vial and creatures resolve. It would help to push aggro in Modern and Legacy.

That “instants or sorceries only” restriction would make red counterspells way narrower than the blue ones, and they would often be relegated to SB as a result. But, Red still gets burn and some "trickery", which would make the color not feel like a watered down Blue. Also note that Red still gets a hard time dealing with enchantments. That would also mean that, in a cycle, Red won’t be stuck with a burn variant anymore – it could easily be a counterspell or have something to do with instants and sorceries.

In a cycle (think Lhurgoyfs, Wishes or Auramancers), Red would care about instants or sorceries, White about enchantments, Blue about artifacts (not about instants anymore, the most powerful card type IHMO), Black about either dead creatures or any card after asking for some life loss, and Green about creatures or lands.

And yeah, Snapcaster Mage would be red after this reconcepting of the color pie.

[GeoSantista]

sorry double post